I 


BT  590  . P9  B86  1922 
Bundy,  Walter  Ernest,  1889- 

The  psychic  health  of  Jesus 


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THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK  •  BOSTON  •  CHICAGO  •  DALLAS 
ATLANTA  •  SAN  FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Limited 

LONDON  •  BOMBAY  •  CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OP  CANADA,  Ltd. 

TORONTO 


THE 


PSYCHIC  HEALTH 
OF  JESUS 


BY 

WALTER  E.  BUNDY,  Ph.D. 

Associate  Professor  of  English  Bible  in  DePauw  University 


to  Ifork 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

1922 


All  rights  reserved 


PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 


Copyright,  1922, 

By  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  printed.  Published  March,  1922. 


“  The  bible  text  used  in  this  volume,  is  taken  from  the 
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Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2019  with  funding  from 
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https://archive.org/details/psychichealthofjOObund_O 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 

PREFACE 

The  task  of  coming  to  a  newer  and  fresher  understanding 
of  Jesus  is  the  bounden  duty  of  all  confessed  Christians, 
whether  orthodox  or  liberal,  theological  or  lay.  The  present 
study  has  been  made  with  this  one  thought  in  mind.  From  the 
more  strictly  scientific  point  of  view  tins  study  aims  at  two 
things:  1)  a  comprehensive  survey  of  the  pathographic  judg¬ 
ment  against  Jesus  in  both  its  early  and  its  developed  stages; 
2)  a  determination  of  the  correctness  of  the  pathographic  posi¬ 
tion  as  based  upon  a  sifting  of  the  New  Testament  sources. 

This  study  makes  no  pretentions  at  psychiatry  proper,  for 
the  writer  is  a  student  of  New  Testament  literature  and  not  a 
specialist  in  mental  diseases.  The  field  of  psychopathology  and 
psychiatry  has  been  avoided  as  consistently  as  possible ;  it  is 
entered  only  when  and  in  so  far  as  the  contentions  against 
Jesus’  psychic  health  have  forced  the  problem,  and  then  only 
in  its  relation  to  the  New  Testament  sources.  At  such  times 
and  points  the  writer  moves  with  all  modesty.  But  be  that  as 
it  may,  the  first  step  is  the  sifting  of  the  sources ;  after  this 
has  been  done  the  psychiatrist  and  the  pathographer  may  go 
to  work. 

Anyone  at  all  acquainted  with  the  critical  works  in  the 
field  of  New  Testament  research  will  recognize  at  once  the 
writer’s  indebtedness  to  many  and  various  authors,  which  in- 
debtedness  the  writer  gratefully  acknowledges.  This  is  still 
more  true  in  regard  to  the  psychiatric  portions  of  the  study. 

Quotations  and  references  to  the  Biblical  books  in  Eng¬ 
lish  are  according  to  the  Standard  Edition  of  the  American 
Revised  Version ;  in  Greek  to  the  Tischendorf-Gebhardt  text 
as  employed  by  Huck  in  his  Synopse  der  drei  ersten  Evangelien. 

Quotations  and  references  to  the  works  of  various  scholars 
and  authors  are  made  by  giving  the  author’s  name  and  the  page 


vn 


vm 


PREFACE 


of  his  work;  the  full  title  and  particulars  regarding  each  work 
cited  are  to  be  found  under  the  author’s  name  in  the  attached 
bibliography.  In  case  more  than  one  work  by  the  same  author 
is  referred  to  each  is  designated  by  an  abbreviation  of  the  title. 

The  writer  would  have  preferred  to  leave  the  numerous 
quotations  from  French  and  German  authors  in  the  original. 
The  majority  of  readers,  however,  will  welcome  the  English 
translations.  These  translations  have  doubtless  lost  some¬ 
thing  in  the  process,  but  the  writer  has  tried  to  translate  as 
faithfully  as  possible. 

One  reader  of  the  original  manuscript  suggested  the  omis¬ 
sion  of  the  materials  in  Chapter  III  for  the  following  reasons: 
It  seems  a  pity  to  give  dignity  to  some  of  the  very  perverted 
views  which  certain  men  have  seen  fit  to  publish.  It  will  shock 
the  majority  of  readers.  From  the  literary  point  of  view,  such 
omission  would  relieve  the  book  of  the  impression  of  being 
repetitious. 

Many  readers  will  doubtless  agree  with  this  opinion.  The 
writer  readily  admits  that  such  a  criticism  is  quite  to  the  point ; 
in  view  of  it  he  has  omitted  some  of  the  more  repugnant  state¬ 
ments  of  Soury  and  Binet-Sangle.  But  the  writer  could  not 
omit  the  materials  in  Chapter  III  entirely,  for  one  of  his  two 
chief  reasons  for  making  the  present  study  was  to  give  in  Eng¬ 
lish  a  precise  presentation  of  the  perverted  views  of  each  of 
Jesus’  pathographers.  This  would  make  a  certain  amount  of 
repetition  in  the  second  half  of  the  study  unavoidable.  The 
writer,  therefore,  has  made  no  effort  to  avoid  a  reproduction 
of  identical  or  similar  materials  wTherever  such  contributes 
either  to  the  clearness  of  the  argument  or  to  the  convenience 
of  the  reader. 

The  present  study  has  its  shortcomings,  both  critical  and 
literary.  That  these  are  not  more  numerous  and  serious  than 
they  are  the  writer  is  indebted  to  Professors  William  J.  Low- 
stuter  and  Edgar  S.  Brightman  of  Boston  University  School 
of  Theology  for  many  valuable  suggestions  and  criticisms. 

Above  all,  the  writer  is  indebted  to  his  faithful  friend  and 
teacher,  Dr.  Albert  C.  Knudson,  Professor  of  Systematic 
Theology  in  Boston  University  School  of  Theology,  not  only 


PREFACE 


IX 


for  very  substantial  aid  in  the  present  study  but  for  the  con¬ 
stant  encouragement  and  inspiration  he  has  given  the  writer 
in  his  pursuit  of  New  Testament  studies. 

The  writer  also  takes  pleasure  in  expressing  his  gratitude 
to  Professors  Paul  Wernle  and  Eduard  Riggenbach  of  the 
Theological  Faculty  of  Basel  Universit}',  Basel,  Switzerland, 
from  whose  lectures  and  works  he  has  learned  much  and  whose 
cordial  and  generous  hospitality  he  enjoyed  during  his  Basel 
semesters, 

Greencastle ,  Indiana.  August  1,  1921, 


/ 


INTRODUCTION 

We  instinctively  recoil  from  seeing  an  object  to  which  our 
emotions  and  affections  are  committed  handled  by  the  intellect 
as  any  other  object  is  handled  (James,  p.  9). 

In  the  discussion  of  the  problem  of  the  psychic  health  of 
Jesus  the  argument  from  religious  sentiment  must,  in  as  far 
as  possible,  be  left  out  of  consideration.  Rut  no  one,  how- 
ever,  would  refuse  to  admit  the  strength  of  this  argument  for 
popular  religious  thought.  The  average  Christian  believer  who 
looks  to  Jesus  as  the  one  and  absolute  religious  example  and 
leader,  and  the  writer  gladly  and  wholeheartedly  confesses  him¬ 
self  to  this  belief,  will  dismiss  the  question  of  Jesus’  psychic 
health  with  little  ceremony  and  less  thought  as  positively  pre¬ 
posterous  and  will  immediately  consign  those  who  have  passed 
a  pathographic  judgment  against  Jesus  to  the  very  institution 
for  the  mentally  morbid  whither,  were  he  living  today,  they 
would  have  Jesus  directed  for  confinement  and  care.  But  the 
serious  student  of  the  New  Testament  cannot  thus  so  summarily 
dismiss  the  question. 

Further,  the  problem  of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  is  not 
to  be  solved  by  an  appeal  to  history,  by  citing  the  high,  helpful 
and  wholesome  influences  that  have  gone  out  from  him  and  in¬ 
spired  so  many  fine  souls  and  societies  to  sentiments  and  deeds 
of  service  and  sacrifice. 

Mental  diseases  in  their  characteristic  forms,  whether  mis¬ 
understood  or  understood,  worshipped  or  deified,  tortured  or 
treated,  condemned,  incarcerated  or  cured,  have  existed  as  far 


XI 


XII 


INTRODUCTION 


back  as  the  earliest  written  records  of  human  history.  Insanity 
has  not  only  always  existed  in  human  society,  but  it  has  often 
had  a  profound  influence  upon  its  history.  If  we  confine  our 
attention  to  modern  times  alone,  we  realize  that  great  geniuses 
of  unquestionable  influence  on  their  own  and  subsequent  genera¬ 
tions  have  manifested  idiosyncrasies  that  have  varied  all  the  way 
from  personal  peculiarities  to  complete  mental  derangement, 
nevertheless  they  have  left  the  world  better  or  different  because 
they  have  lived  and  worked.  And  often  it  has  been  the  case  that 
just  their  traits  of  abnormality  account  best  for  their  inex¬ 
haustible  energy  in  accomplishment.  Religious  geniuses  have 
often  shown  symptoms  of  nervous  instability.  Even  more  per¬ 
haps  than  any  other  hinds  of  genius ,  religious  leaders  have  been 
subject  to  abnormal  psychical  visitations . Often ,  more¬ 

over ,  these  pathological  features  in  their  career  have  helped  to 
give  them  their  religious  authority  and  influence  (James,  p.  6f). 

H.  Maudsley  asks,  What  right  have  we  to  believe  nature 
under  obligation  to  do  her  work  by  means  of  complete  minds 
only?  She  may  find  an  incomplete  mind  a  more  suitable  instru¬ 
ment  for  a  particular  purpose  (Quoted  by  James,  p.  19).  In 
discussing  the  unusual  psychical  experiences  of  the  Apostle 
Paul,  W.  Wrede  asks,  Why  should  these  yearnings ,  the  inspira¬ 
tions  and  struggles  which  took  on  the  form  of  ecstasies ,  become 
less  noble  simply  because  they  did  assume  this  form?  Still  we 
shall  always  feel  that  the  phenomenon  itself  is  something  mor¬ 
bid  (Paulus,  S.  16).  Regarding  the  social  and  historical  sig¬ 
nificance  of  hallucinations  Krafft-Ebing  writes,  There  is  hardi¬ 
ly  a  phenomenon  of  human  life  which ,  throughout  the  ages ,  has 
been  more  variously  judged  by  the  church,  philosophy  and  nat¬ 
ural  science.  The  history  of  hallucinations  contains  a  part  of 
the  history  of  the  civilization  of  all  peoples  and  all  times,  and 
is  a  mirror  of  religious  opinions.  Hallucinations  have  caused 
the  most  important  historic  events  ( visions  of  the  cross  by  Con¬ 
stantine  the  Great),  founded  religions  ( Mohammed ),  and  led  to 
the  most  horrible  errors  in  the  form  of  superstition,  ghosts ,  and 
persecution  of  witches ,  etc.  (p.  llOf). 

Psychanalysis,  descriptive  psychology  and  psychopathol¬ 
ogy  do  not  follow  the  injunction  and  criterion  of  Jesus,  By 


INTRODUCTION 


xm 


their  fruits  ye  shall  know  them ,  nor  James’  supplement,  not  by 
their  roots  (p.  20).  It  is  exactly  in  the  roots  of  unusual  psy¬ 
chical  phenomena  that  psychopathology  in  particular  is  inter¬ 
ested,  and  not  in  the  logical  and  practical  historical  values  of 
their  productions.  Its  problem  is  not  one  of  values,  but  of 
origins.  As  Dr.  Moerchen  writes  in  his  little  pamphlet,  Die 
Psychologie  der  Heiligkeit,  it  is  not  the  task  of  descriptive  psy¬ 
chology  Werturteile  ueber  den  Wahrheitsgehalt  des  religioesen 
G  e  dank  e  ninh  alt  es  zu  faellen;  weder  koennen  wir  ueber  das  JVes- 
en,  den  Gegenstand  des  religioesen  Ge  dank  eninJi  alt  es  an  sich  et- 
was  aussagen ,  noch  viel  weniger  Werturteile  ueber  den  Wahr¬ 
heitsgehalt  dieser  Inhalt e  (S.  8.)  Descriptive  psychology  is 
interested  solely  in  the  causes  and  course  of  psychic  processes ; 
psychopathology  asks  but  one  question,  normal  or  abnormal? 
healthy  or  morbid? 

The  appeal  to  history  may  be  a  practical  and  pragmatic 
way  of  meeting  a  charge  against  the  psychic  health  of  any 
great  man  of  the  past,  but  it  does  not  solve  the  problem  to  be 
solved,  nor  does  it  test  the  truth  of  the  diagnosis.  It  may  en¬ 
able  us  to  entertain  a  very  high  opinion  and  appreciation  of  the 
particular  individual  and  not  hinder  us  from  deriving  the  great¬ 
est  possible  benefit  from  his  life  and  work,  but  the  judgment  of 
the  pathographer  continues  to  stand.  Rasmussen  speaks  of  the 
Apostle  Paul  as  a  man  whose  tremendous  influence  and  signifi¬ 
cance  in  the  history  of  the  world  since  is  incontestable,  yet  he 
pronounces  him  an  epileptic,  (S.  79).  In  discussing  the  fanat¬ 
icism  of  Jesus,  Strauss  remarked  that  the  fanatic  can  be  a  noble 
and  inspiring  character,  he  can  stimulate  and  elevate,  and  can 
exercise  a  lasting  influence  for  good  upon  the  course  of  history 
and  the  development  of  thought,  but  we  today  would  not  care 
to  choose  him  as  our  guide  and  leader  in  life. 

Of  the  six  writers  whose  positions  involve  the  psychic 
health  of  Jesus  only  two  (Hirsch  and  Binet-Sangle)  fail  to  find 
something  that  is  great,  or  even  grand,  in  the  person  or  teach¬ 
ing  of  Jesus.  Rasmussen  finds  that  it  is  just  the  pathological 
element  in  Jesus  that  has  been  preserved  and  has  triumphed; 
the  best  in  him  has  been  neglected.  De  Loosten  cannot  praise 
the  intellectual  ability  of  Jesus  too  highly  and  finds  his  dialectic 


XIV 


INTRODUCTION 


in  the  Jerusalem  contentions  without  a  parallel  in  history. 
Baumann  praises  his  devotion  to  a  great  community  ideal  and 
his  passion  for  service  and  sacrifice.  Yet  all  of  these  conces¬ 
sions  do  not  prevent  these  writers  from  diagnosing  Jesus’  case 
as  epilepsy,  paranoia,  or  excessive  nervousness  bordering  on 
hysteria.  O.  Holtzmann  presented  Jesus  as  through  and 
through  an  ecstatic  character,  but  he  is  still  a  professor  of 
theology. 

The  attitude  of  Jesus’  pathographers  (here  Holtzmann  is  to 
be  excluded)  toward  any  permanent  values  expressed  in  his  per¬ 
son  or  teaching  and  subsequent  benefits  to  be  derived  therefrom 
is  best  expressed  in  a  figure  employed  by  two  of  them  (Rasmus¬ 
sen  and  Hirsch)  :  the  morbid  mussel  can  pro¬ 
duce  a  priceless  pear  1  .  It  is  worth  while  to  quote 
Rasmussen  in  full:  We  do  not  go  so  far  as  to  declare  every¬ 
thing  worthless  that  proceeds  from  a  morbid  mind.  We  do  not 
deny  that  a  morbid  mussel  can  produce  a  pearl;  still  less  do  we 
pronounce  the  mussel  healthy  in  consideration  of  the  pearl.  The 
lamp  of  the  spirit  will  smoke  if  it  is  turned  too  high ,  and  the 
smoke  can  become  so  dense  that  the  flame  is  dimmed;  but  even 
then  it  can  give  forth  light ,  be  of  benefit  and  valued  according 
to  its  usefulness  and  strength.  For  we  appraise  our  ideas  not 
according  to  their  origin ,  but  according  to  their  true  worth 
(S.  130). 

For  the  serious  student  of  the  New  Testament  the  problem 
of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  is  not  to  be  solved  by  religious 
recoil  at  the  thought  of  such  a  suggestion,  nor  by  an  appeal  to 
history,  but  it  is  to  be  faced  and  met  on  the  basis  of  an  histori¬ 
cal  and  critical  study  of  the  sources  of  our  knowledge  concern¬ 
ing  Jesus’  words  and  deeds  as  found  in  the  Gospel  literature. 
The  battle  is  to  be  fought  out  on  the  field  of  the  New  Testa¬ 
ment,  and  any  shift  of  the  scene  of  action  from  this  field  renders 
the  issue  unscientific  and  indecisive. 

The  problem,  further,  cannot  be  considered  mainly  psy¬ 
chiatric,  for  the  possibility  of  observation  is  hopelessly  out  of 
the  question.  Besides  the  contentions  against  the  psychic  health 
of  Jesus  have  not  been  made  by  psychiatrists,  but  by  patho¬ 
graphers.  The  problem  is  therefore  pathographic. 


INTRODUCTION 


xv 


As  such  it  remains  and  must  of  necessity  remain  an  historical 
critical  problem.  It  is  to  be  met  and  solved  only  by  a  critical 
and  historical  study  of  the  literary  sources.  For  this  reason 
the  raising  of  the  problem  is  to  be  welcomed,  and  the  struggle, 
though  it  be  in  the  night  time,  will  not  pass  without  having  im¬ 
parted  its  blessing  upon  the  wrestler.  The  problem  is  to  be 
welcomed  as  is  any  problem  that  demands  and  forces  a  recon¬ 
sideration  of  the  character  of  Jesus  from  a  new  point  of  view. 

Psychology  has  never  been  able  to  do  much  with  Jesus. 
Such  studies  are  usually  disappointing,  perhaps  for  the  reason 
that  we  expect  too  much  from  such  a  promising  point  of  view. 
But,  as  we  shall  see  later,  even  the  positive  estimate  of  Jesus 
will  find  the  study  of  Inis  known  life  more  interesting,  instructive 
and  inspiring  from  the  viewpoint  of  abnormal  than  normal  psy¬ 
chology  because  of  the  contrasting  lights  the  former  throws  on 
his  person.  It  is  only  as  we  begin  to  inquire  into  the  healthi¬ 
ness  of  such  experiences  as  are  attributed  to  Jesus  at  the  Jor¬ 
dan  and  in  the  wilderness,  to  apply  to  what  we  know  of  him  the 
tests  of  health,  that  the  positive  psychic  powers  of  Jesus  begin 
fully  to  appear. 

Christianity  has  been  helped  along  in  the  world  more  by  its 
critics  than  by  its  too  sympathetic  friends.  We  have  only  to 
cite  the  work  of  Strauss  by  which  he  threw  his  three  great  ques¬ 
tions  out  into  the  theological  world  of  his  day  and  caused  a 
commotion  and  confusion  that  has  not  entirely  died  out  even 
down  to  this  very  hour.  With  his  first  Leben  Jesu  (1835) 
Strauss  did  more  to  stir  the  thick  theological  thought  of  his  day 
out  of  its  selfish  sluggishness  and  help  along  the  life-of- Jesus 
research  than  any  other  critic  before  or  after  him.  Strauss 
compelled  his  contented  and  complacent  critic  contemporaries 
to  reread  and  restudy  the  Gospels,  which  he  knew  and  knew  bet¬ 
ter  how  to  use  than  they. 

It  is  the  high  duty,  and  should  be  the  pleasure,  of  every 
follower  of  Jesus  to  greet  and  welcome  any  study  that  will 
throw  new  light  upon  the  person  of  Jesus  and  help  to  a  renewed, 
perhaps  new,  appreciation  and  understanding  of  him.  The 
raising  of  the  problem  of  Jesus’  psychic  health,  we  repeat,  is  to 
be  welcomed  as  all  new  problems  should  be,  sorry  to  say  not  al- 


XVI 


INTRODUCTION 


ways  have  been  and  are,  welcomed  because  it  brings  us  to  read 
our  New  Testament  again  from  a  different  point  of  view  and 
with  new  thoughts  in  mind. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 


Preface  . . .  vii 

Introduction  .  xi 

Chapter  I.  The  Earlier  Stages  of  the  Problem  .  . .  1 

1)  David  Friedrich  Strauss .  2 

2)  Ernest  Renan  . 7 

3)  Eduard  von  Hartmann  . .  .  9 

4)  Friedrich  Nietzsche .  16 

5)  Jules  Soury  . .  .  20 

6)  L.  K.  Washburn  .  24 

Chapter  II.  Factors  Contributing  to  the  Rise  of  the  Problem.  29 

1)  Philosophical  .  29 

2)  Scientific  . 31 

3)  Historico-critical  .  38 

4)  Popular  Psychological  Presentations  .  43 

Chapter  III.  The  Problem  Proper .  47 

1)  Jesus — An  Ecstatic  . 48 

Oscar  Holtzmann  .  48 

2)  Jesus — An  Epileptic  .  56 

Emil  Rasmussen  .  56 

3)  Jesus — A  Paranoiac  .  67 

Dr.  de  Loosten  (Georg  Lomer)  . . .  .  67 

William  Hirsch  .  79 

Dr.  C.  Binet-Sangle  . .  86 

4)  Jesus — A  Case  of  Nerves  . 107 

Julius  Baumann  . 107 

5)  Jesus  in  Fiction  . ...Ill 

6)  The  Defense  of  Jesus’  Psychic  Health . 113 

Chapter  IV.  The  Sources  from  the  Pathographic  Point  of 

View  . 127 

1)  The  Fourth  Gospel . 128 

2)  The  Synoptics  . 136 

A)  Discourse  Matter  . 136 

a)  Egocentric  Words  of  Jesus  . . 137 

b)  Eschatological  Elements  . 145 

c)  Social  Teachings  . 145 

B)  Biographical  Incidents  . 147 

a)  Jesus  at  Twelve  Years  . 147 

b)  The  Baptism  . 149 

c)  The  Temptation  . 152 

d)  Me  3,21;  Jesus  and  His  Contemporaries  .  .  .159 


xvn 


xvm 


CONTENTS 


e)  The  Transfiguration . 165 

f)  The  Cursing  of  the  Fig  Tree . 168 

g)  The  Cleansing  of  the  Temple . 171 

h)  Gethsemane  . 175 

Chapter  V.  The  Personality  of  Jesus  from  the  Pathographic 

Point  of  View  . 180 

1)  His  Conduct  . 180 

2)  His  Character  . 191 

3)  His  Consciousness  . 199 

A)  Its  Rise  . 201 

B)  Its  Reinforcement  . 206 

C)  Its  Form  . 213 

D)  Its  Contend  Control  and  Confession . 219 

Excursus — The  x4ffliction  of  Paul  . 224 

Chapter  VI.  The  Pathography  of  Jesus . 231 

1)  The  Possibility  of  a  Diagnosis  in  the  Case  of  Jesus  .  .231 

2)  Heredity  . 234 

3)  Somatic  Symptoms  . 239 

4)  Psychic  Symptoms  . 240 

A)  The  Emotions  of  Jesus  . 242 

B)  The  Intellect  of  Jesus . 246 

C)  The  Will  of  Jesus  . 251 

5)  Was  Jesus  an  Epileptic?  . 253 

6)  Was  Jesus  a  Paranoiac?  . 257 

7)  Was  Jesus  an  Ecstatic?  . 259 

8)  Was  Jesus  a  Fanatic? . 263 

9)  Pathography  . 266 

Bibliography  . 270 

Index  of  Scripture  Passages  . 283 

Personal  Register  . 293 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


' 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 

CHAPTER  I 

The  Earlier  Stages  of  the  Problem 

Albert  Schweitzer  (GdLJF.,  S.  10)  divides  the  life-of- 
Jesus  research  into  two  principal  periods:  that  before  and  that 
after  Strauss.  This  division  holds  good  for  our  present  study, 
for  it  is  Strauss  who  projects  the  first  really  negative  picture 
of  Jesus  in  a  pathological  sense.  The  discussion  during  the 
first  period  was  dominated  for  the  most  part  by  the  question 
of  miracle  as  treated  by  the  rationalistic  school  of  thought  in 
its  various  stages  of  development.  Two  distinct  steps  were 
taken  by  this  school  in  the  explanation  of  miracle:  1)  the  re¬ 
duction  of  the  number  of  Jesus’  miracles  to  the  lowest  possible 
minimum;  2)  the  explanation  of  the  reduced  number  on  a  pure¬ 
ly  naturalistic  basis.  This  did  not  always  succeed,  however, 
without  compromising  either  the  character  and  conduct  of  Jesus 
and  his  disciples,  or  the  integrity  of  the  Gospel  writers.  With 
Strauss  the  question  of  miracle  was  settled  in  a  wray  and  for  a 
time  at  least.  After  Strauss  the  biographers  of  Jesus  were 
busied  with  the  new  problems  formulated  or  suggested  by  him. 

Both  periods  had  their  Chcirakterbilder  Jesu.  In  general, 
it  can  be  said  that  during  the  first  period  a  supernaturalistic 
and  positive  picture  was  taken  of  Jesus’  person  and  character. 
During  the  second  period,  however,  there  arose  a  more  natural¬ 
istic  and  human  interpretation  of  the  historical  Jesus  that  was 
not  infrequently  accompanied  by  a  tendency  toward  a  negative 
view  of  his  person  and  character.  With  the  exception  of  Rein- 
hard  all  the  names  that  are  of  interest  to  us  in  the  problem  of 
the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  fall  within  the  second  period. 

The  selection  of  names  from  the  great  number  that  have 
been  prominent  in  the  life-of- Jesus  research  for  discussion  in 

1 


2 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


the  earlier  stages  of  our  present  problem  is,  of  course,  deter¬ 
mined  by  their  relation  to  the  problem  itself.  Thus  we  natur¬ 
ally  exclude  some  of  the  greatest  lives  of  Jesus  that  have  been 
written,  like  those  of  Hase,  Keim,  Beyschlag,  etc.,  all  of  which 
projected  their  Charahterbilder  Jesu.  And  we  give  unusual 
prominence  to  names  almost  unknown,  like  Washburn,  and  in¬ 
clude  names  that  hardly  belong  in  the  life-of- Jesus  research, 
like  Nietzsche,  except  from  our  present  point  of  view. 

In  the  nineteenth  century,  the  century  great  in  its  lives 
of  Jesus,  only  some  half  dozen  men  are  of  interest  to  us.  The 
problem  proper  of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  belongs  to  the 
twentieth  century,  but,  as  we  shall  see,  it  had  its  roots  well 
planted  in  the  nineteenth.  (For  Binet-Sangle’s  history  of  the 
discovery  of  the  insanity  of  Jesus  see  his  work,  IV  297-326. 
He  represents  it  as  beginning  with  Me  3,21  and  coming  to  its 
conclusion  in  his  own  research). 

1)  David  Friedrich  Strauss 

Strauss  is  the  first  critic  of  significance  to  project  a  nega¬ 
tive  picture  of  Jesus  in  the  psychopathic  sense,  but  he  did  not 
do  this  in  his  first  Leben  Jesu  which  appeared  in  two  volumes 
in  1835.  In  spite  of  his  almost  entire  elimination  of  miracle 
from  the  ministry  of  Jesus  and  his  complete  rejection  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  as  a  trustworthy  source  of  historical  knowl¬ 
edge  concerning  what  Jesus  said  and  did,  nevertheless  Strauss’ 
view  of  Jesus’  person  and  character  in  his  1835  Leben  Jesu  is 
purely  positive,  for  he  defends  Jesus  against  any  serious  sus¬ 
picion  of  fanaticism  (Schzvaermerei) . 

It  is  worth  while  noting  just  here  that  the  pathological 
problem  in  the  case  of  Jesus  arose  in  connection  with  the  first 
attempts  to  construe  and  give  some  sort  of  an  historical  account 
of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  and  its  contents.  In  the  entire  his¬ 
tory  of  the  question  of  Jesus’  psychic  health  the  Schwerpunkt 
of  the  discussion  has  always  remained  just  here  and  is  the  pre¬ 
dominant  factor  in  the  1905-  form  of  the  question. 

Strauss  attempted  no  systematic  psychological  survey  of 
Jesus’  self-consciousness  as  was  later  done  by  Baldensperger, 
H.  J.  Holtzmann,  and  others.  But  the  question  of  Jesus’  psy- 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


3 


chic  soundness,  though  it  did  not  thus  form  itself  so  definitely 
for  his  thought,  is  touched  upon  by  Strauss  in  his  discussion 
of  Jesus’  claim  for  his  consciousness.  In  his  first  Leben  Jesu, 
he  comes  upon  the  problem  in  two  short  passages :  the  first, 
regarding  the  Johannine  claims  of  Jesus  for  himself ;  and  the 
second,  regarding  his  Synoptic  claims. 

The  first  passage  (I  542ff)  has  to  do  with  the  Johannine 
representation  of  Jesus  claiming  for  himself  the  prerogative  of 
preexistence.  Such  passages  as  Jn  3,13  and  16,28  are  not 
real  claims  for  preexistence  but  are  rather  to  be  regarded  as 
a  symbolic  designation  of  a  higher ,  divine  origin  (I  542). 
However,  such  passages  as  6,62 ;  8,58  and  17,5  cannot  be  ex¬ 
plained  in  any  such  figurative  fashion.  Strauss  inclines  strong¬ 
ly  to  reject  these  as  real  words  of  Jesus  because  they  are  purely 
Johannine  and  without  parallels  in  the  Synoptic  discourse  ma¬ 
terials,  and  further,  to  assign  all  these  claims  for  preexist¬ 
ence  in  the  words  of  Jesus  to  the  composition  of  the  author  of 
the  Fourth  Gospel.  He  goes  on  to  say,  Thus  it  will  always  re¬ 
main  doubtful  whether  it  ( the  claim  for  preexistence)  belongs 
to  Jesus'  own  view  of  himself  or  only  to  the  reflection  of  the 
fourth  evangelist  (I  546).  But  if  it  is  allowed  that  Jesus  really 
spoke  these  words  out  of  his  supposed  recollection  of  a  pre¬ 
human  and  pre-worldly  state,  it  simply  means  the  destruction 
of  healthy  human  consciousness  and  exposes  him  to  a  fanati¬ 
cism  from  which  he  otherwise  shows  himself  free  (I  543f). 

The  second  passage  (I  553f)  has  to  do  with  Jesus’  outlook 
in  the  Synoptics  (Me  13,26;  Mt  24,30;  Lc  21,27)  for  his 
return  in  the  role  of  the  Son  of  man  in  the  sense  of  Daniel  7,13. 
Strauss  took  no  offense  at  this  word  of  Jesus,  which,  he  says, 
taken  apart  from  the  apocalyptic  atmosphere  of  the  times  in 
which  it  was  spoken  would  be,  in  and  of  itself,  a  very  audacious 
and  adventurous  notion.  There  is  no  reason  for  rejecting  this 
idea  of  Jesus  because  it  would  seem  to  make  a  fanatic  of  him, 
as  DeWette  seems  to  have  thought  and  against  vThom  the  fol¬ 
lowing  statement  seems  to  be  directed :  Whoever  shuns  this 
view  of  the  background  of  the  Messianic  plan  of  Jesus  simply 
because  he  fears  that  thereby  he  would  make  a  fanatic  of  Jesus , 
let  him  consider  how  exactly  these  hopes  corresponded  to  the 


4 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


long  cherished  hopes  of  the  Jews ,  and  how  easily  upon  the  su- 
pernaturalistic  soil  of  that  time  and  in  the  secluded  circle  of  the 
Jewish  nation  a  conception  in  and  of  itself  adventurous ,  if  it 
were  only  nationalistic  in  character  and  besides  had  its  true  and 
splendid  elements,  could  win  for  itself  even  a  prudent  person 
(I  553 f). 

Thus  we  see  in  his  first  Leben  Jesu  that  Strauss  comes  up¬ 
on  the  question  of  Jesus’  fanaticism,  but  decides  it  in  a  very 
positive  way  designating  Jesus  as  einen  besonnenen  Mann.  But 
this  is  not  true  of  his  second  life  of  Jesus  which  appeared  in 
two  volumes  in  1864  under  the  title  Das  Leben  Jesu  fuer  das 
deutsche  Volk  bearbeitet.  This  second  work  of  Strauss  was 
translated  into  English  and  published  under  the  title  A  New 
Life  of  Jesus.  The  quotations  below  from  this  English  trans¬ 
lation  are  according  to  the  second  edition,  1879;  the  references 
to  the  original  correspond  to  the  twenty-first  German  edition. 

The  transition  of  Strauss’  turn  to  a  negative  view  of  Jesus 
is  seen  in  a  letter  addressed  b}*-  him  to  Kaeferli  dated  June  15, 
1862,  just  a  year  and  a  half  before  he  finished  his  second  Leben 
Jesu  (Jan.  24,  1864),  in  which  he  writes:  If  one  surrenders 
the  orthodox  view  of  Jesus,  then  one  has  before  him  a  fanatic : 
and  such  a  fearful  fanatic,  that  it  is  diffictilt  to  conceive  of 
such  a  combination  of  so  much  fanaticism  and  so  much  reason 
(Quoted  by  Wellhausen,  Einl.  S.  150,  Anm.  1).  Strauss’  turn 
toward  a  pathological  view  of  Jesus  is, to  be  best  explained  by 
the  personal  embitterment  that  he  cherished  in  consequence  of 
the  unhappy  fate  that  his  first  Leben  Jesu  brought  down  upon 
him. 

From  the  scientific  point  of  view  Strauss’  1864  Leben  Jesu 
marks  a  distinct  degeneration  in  the  critical  character  of  his 
work.  It  contains  too  much  that  is  the  product  of  resentment 
and  too  little  of  his  earlier  careful,  clear  and  consequent  criti¬ 
cism.  In  this  work  he  comes  again  to  speak  on  the  same  two 
questions  of  Jesus’  claim  of  preexistence  and  his  apocalyptic 
aspirations  in  the  same  connections  as  in  his  first  work,  but  here 
we  find  an  unsympathetic  and  negative  tone  that  is  totally  lack¬ 
ing  in  his  1835  work.  Concerning  the  Johannine  claim  of 
preexistence  he  writes :  It  is  indeed  inconceivable  to  us  that  any 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


5 


person  in  the  flesh  should  remember  an  ante-natal  existence , 
even  independent  of  the  fact  that  in  the  present  case  it  is  sup¬ 
posed  to  have  been  a  divine  existence  reaching  back  to  a  period 
before  the  creation  of  the  world.  It  is  inconceivable  to  us,  be¬ 
cause  in  accredited  history  no  instance  of  it  has  occurred.  And 
if  any  one  should  speak  of  having  such  a  recollection ,  we  should 
consider  him  a  fool  or,  if  not,  an  impostor  (Eng.,  I  271f ;  Ger., 
I  lOlf).  But  a  man,  whoever  he  may  have  been,  could  never, 
if  his  heart  and  head  were  sound,  have  uttered  such  speeches 
about  himself  as  are  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  the  Fourth 
Gospel . The  speeches  of  Jesus  about  himself  in  this  Gos¬ 

pel  are  an  uninterrupted  Doxology,  only  translated  out  of  the 
second  person  into  the  first  (Eng.,  I  272;  Ger.,  I  102).  They 
run  along  too  characteristically  in  the  tone  of  the  fourth 
evangelist’s  thought  in  his  prologue,  and  too  foreign  to  the 
thought  of  Jesus  as  represented  in  the  Synoptics,  to  be  ascribed 
to  the  historical  Jesus.  But  when  he  (the  enthusiastic  Chris¬ 
tian)  goes  so  far  as  the  Fourth  Evangelist,  and  puts  the  utter¬ 
ances  of  his  own  pious  enthusiasm  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in 
the  form  of  his  own  utterances  about  himself,  he  does  him  a 
very  perilous  service  (Eng.,  I  273;  Ger.,  I  102). 

In  his  1861  Leben  Jesu  Strauss  devotes  fuller  considera¬ 
tion,  a  whole  separate  paragraph  (39),  to  the  Messianic  return. 
He  says :  To  a  human  being  no  such  thing  as  he  here  prophesied 
of  himself,  could  happen.  If  he  did  prophesy  it  of  himself ,  and 
expect  it  himself,  he  is  for  us  nothing  but  a  fanatic;  if,  without 
any  conviction  on  his  part ,  he  said  it  of  himself,  he  was  a  brag¬ 
gart  and  impostor . He  who  expects  to  come  again  after 

his  death,  as  no  human  being  has  ever  done,  is  in  our  opinion 
not  exactly  a  madman,  because  in  reference  to  the  future  imag¬ 
ination  is  more  possible,  but  still  an  arrant  enthusiast  (Eng.,  I 
322f ;  Ger.,  I  120).  But  Strauss  regards  these  words  of  Jesus 
concerning  his  return  as  historical ;  they  are  not  to  be  denied 
or  neutralized  by  some  unnatural  explanation.  Then  he  asks : 
Or,  lastly  shall  we  make  him  bear  the  burden  of  them  in  the  full 
meaning  of  the  words,  and  therefore  be  compelled  to  admit  that 
he  was  a  fanatic,  and  not  a  common  one  either?  An  affirmative 
answer  to  this  question,  he  says,  is  not  something  altogether  in - 


6 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


conceivable  (Eng.,  I  323;  Ger.,  I  121).  The  expectation  of 
such  a  thing  (Me  13,26),  on  one's  own  behalf  is  something 
quite  different  from  a  general  expectation  of  it ,  and  he  who  ex¬ 
pects  it  of  himself  and  for  himself  will  not  only  appear  to  us 
in  the  light  of  a  fanatic ,  but  we  see  also  an  unallowable  self¬ 
exaltation  in  a  man's  ( and  it  is  only  of  a  human  being  that  we 
are  everywhere  speaking)  so  putting  himself  above  everyone 
else  as  to  contrast  himself  with  them  as  their  future  Judge 
(Eng.,  I  331;  Ger.,  I  124).  It  might  be  ever  so  disagreeable 
to  us  with  our  Christian  habits  of  thought ,  but  if  such  should 
prove  itself  to  be  the  case  (that  Jesus  was  a  fanatic)  as  the  re¬ 
sult  of  historical  research ,  then  our  Christian  habits  of  thought 
must  give  way.  Further,  one  has  no  right  to  say  that  a  fanatic 
could  not  have  had  the  historical  influence  that  has  gone  forth 
from  him  nor  have  been  capable  of  the  high  and  wholesome  in¬ 
sights  we  have  been  discussing.  This  may  be  true  of  an  impos¬ 
tor  whom  we  leave  out  of  consideration  entirely.  But  the  dis¬ 
covery  of  high  gifts  of  mind  and  superiorities  of  soul  combined 
with  a  prominent  element  of  fanaticism  (mit  einer  Dosis 
Schwaermerei)  is  not  such  an  unusual  occurrence,  and  it  can  be 
asserted  of  the  great  men  of  history  that  not  one  of  them  has 
been  wholly  free  from  fanaticism  (Ger.,  I  121). 

But  this  idea  of  Jesus’  expectation  of  a  personal  return 
became  still  more  intolerable  to  Strauss,  and  he  wrote  to  Lang 
on  October  16  of  the  same  year  that  he  finished  his  second  Leben 
Jesu :  For  me  this  idea  borders  close  on  msanity  (Ziegler, 
II  609). 

Strauss  finished  his  Der  Alte  und  der  Neue  Glaube  in  Octo¬ 
ber  1872.  Paragraphs  4-32  deal  with  the  first  of  the  four 
questions  which  Strauss  seeks  to  answer  in  this  book:  Are  we 
still  Christians?  This  question  he  answers  in  the  negative: 
It  is  my  conviction  that,  if  we  refuse  to  resort  to  subterfuge, 
if  we  will  not  turn  and  twist  words,  in  short  if  we  want  to  speak 
as  serious  and  honest  person s,  we  must  confess :  We  are  no  long¬ 
er  Christians  (S.  61). 

To  paragraph  30  Strauss  gives  the  title:  Das  Schwaer- 
merische  in  seinem  Wesen.  Here  Strauss,  in  substance  at  least, 
repeats  his  position  in  his  1864  life  of  Jesus  regarding  Jesus’ 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


7 


expectation  of  his  own  personal  return:  If  he  was  not  this  (a 
higher,  superhuman  being)  hut  only  a  mere  man  and  yet  cher¬ 
ished  this  expectation ,  then  we  can  help  neither  ourselves  nor 
him;  according  to  our  conceptions  he  was  a  fanatic.  This  word 
has  ceased  long  ago  to  he  an  affront  and  insult  such  as  it  was 
in  the  last  century.  We  know  that  there  have  been  noble  and 
intelligent  fanatics.  A  fanatic  can  rouse  and  elevate,  and  his 
work  may  he  historically  lasting,  but  we  shall  not  want  to  choose 
him  as  a  guide  in  life.  He  will  lead  us  into  devious  paths  unless 
we  place  his  influence  under  the  control  of  our  reason  (S.  52f). 

Thus  Strauss  ends  by  definitely  designating  Jesus  as  a 
fanatic,  conceding  that  even  a  fanatic  can  be  of  considerable 
historical  significance,  but  entirely  omitting  the  reference  to  the 
apocalyptic  atmosphere  of  Jesus’  time  by  which  he  defended 
Jesus  against  the  charge  of  fanaticism  in  1835.  The  last  sen¬ 
tence  above  quoted  makes  clear  Strauss’  turn  toward  the  hated 
rationalism  which  he  made  so  ridiculous  in  his  first  Lehen  Jesu. 

2)  Ernest  Renan 

Renan  was  the  first  to  attempt  to  come  psychologically 
close  to  Jesus.  His  success,  however,  is  very  questionable.  O. 
Holtzmann  praises  Renan  as  the  first  who  saw  in  Jesus’  en¬ 
thusiastic  faith  the  reed  source  of  Jesus’  power  (WJE.,  S.  9, 
Anm.  1).  Renan  confines  this  enthusiastic  element  to  the  last 
weeks  of  Jesus’  public  career. 

The  degeneration  which  Renan  found  in  the  character  and 
career  of  Jesus  was  not  psychological,  but  moral.  In  the  last 
period  of  his  career  Jesus  degenerated  from  the  genial  aphor¬ 
istic  philosopher  of  optimistic  morality  to  a  sinister  preacher 
of  pessimism  appealing  to  the  popular  thought  of  his  day  by 
•undertaking  the  role  of  a  political  revolutionist  and  profes¬ 
sional  thaumaturge  (p.  170).  Jesus’  resort  to  miracle  con¬ 
stituted  a  collapse  in  his  morale.  This  was  brought  about  by 
his  increasing  unpopularity  with  the  masses,  the  growing  op¬ 
position  of  the  religious  leaders,  and  the  earlier  unwholesome 
influence  of  the  Baptist  whom  Providence  kindly  removed  from 
the  scene  before  Jesus’  moral  break  became  complete,  as  it 
threatened  at  the  beginning.  If  it  had  come  when  it  threatened 


8 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


to  do  so  earlier  in  Jesus’  public  career,  the  break  would  have 
left  Jesus  only  an  unknown  Jewish  sectarian  (p.  78). 

Upon  his  last  return  to  Galilee,  Jesus  begins  to  ascribe  to 
his  owm  person  entirely  new  functions  in  the  realization  of  the 
kingdom  of  God.  The  kingdom  can  now  come  only  by  violence, 
and  Jesus  regards  himself  as  the  indispensable  victim.  But  this 
is  not  all:  After  his  death  the  Son  of  man  is  to  come  with  glory, 
accompanied  by  legions  of  angels,  and  those  who  repel  him  are 
to  be  confounded  (p.  170). 

Here  Renan  does  not  take  offense,  as  did  Strauss  in  his 
later  life,  and  as  have  the  recent  formulators  of  the  question 
of  Jesus’  psychic  health.  The  audacity  of  this  conception  is 
not  at  all  surprising,  says  Renan,  for  Jesus  had  long  before 
set  himself  in  a  relation  to  God  as  a  son  to  his  father.  On  the 
contrary,  this  claim  of  Jesus  stands  in  closest  correspondence 
with  his  character  and  is  not  at  all  out  of  place  for  him:  That 
which  in  the  case  of  others  would  be  intolerable  pride  should  not 
in  his  case,  however,  be  characterized  as  an  outrage  (p.  171). 
It,  therefore,  does  not  raise  a  pathological  problem  for  Renan 
as  it  has  for  others. 

All  great  movements  in  history  have  been  inspired  or  ac¬ 
companied  by  a  certain  amount  of  illusion.  The  admixture  of 
illusions  heretofore  to  be  found  in  all  great  movements,  whether 
political  or  religious,  is  not  a  sufficiejit  reason  for  refusing  to 
accord  to  these  movements  our  sympathy  and  admiration .  .  .  . 

.  .  One  can  love  Jeanne  d’Arc  without  admitting  the  reality  of 
her  visions  (p.  12).  Jesus’  illusion  regarding  the  immediate 
proximity  of  the  end  Renan  designates  as  an  illusion  common  to 
all  great  reformers  (p.  186).  He  further  excuses  Jesus  on  the 
basis  of  this  idea  not  being  peculiar  to  himself  but  common 
among  his  contemporaries :  Let  us  pardon  him  liis  expectation 
of  coming  in  triumph  on  the  clouds  of  heaven.  Perhaps  this 
was  the  error  of  others  rather  than  his  own  (p.  186).  Jesus’ 
errors  of  judgment,  according  to  Renan,  were  merely  those  in¬ 
nocent  errors  common  to  childish  credulity  and  beautiful  piety, 
and  wTere  due  to  his  childish  idea  of  the  familiar  relationship 
existing  between  God  and  man  and  his  exaggerated  faith  in  the 
ability  of  man.  These  were  the  happy  errors  which  constituted 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


9 


the  principle  of  his  force  (p.  31),  and  gave  to  him  the  power  of 
making  an  impression  on  his  time  which  no  one,  before  or  since, 
has  been  able  to  exercise  in  a  comparable  degree. 

Renan  unconsciously  hints  at  the  pathological  problem, 
but  it  does  not  seriously  occur  to  him ;  otherwise  he  would  have 
given  it  some  sort  of  definite  consideration.  He  solves  the  errors 
of  judgment  in  the  great  men  of  history  by  the  appeal  to  his¬ 
tory:  Till  now  the  alienated  mind  has  never  been  able  to  influ¬ 
ence  seriously  the  course  of  human  history  (German  transla¬ 
tion,  Reclam,  S.  85).  Renan’s  chief  regret  in  the  case  of  Jesus 
is  his  surrender  of  his  early  Galilean  idealism  which  he  yielded 
under  the  pressure  of  events.  He  thus  finds  only  a  moral  de¬ 
generation  in  the  character  of  Jesus. 

3)  Eduard  von  Hartmann 

Eduard  von  Hartmann’s  book,  Das  Christ entum  des  Neuen 
Testaments  (1905),  is  the  second  and  revised  edition  of  his 
Briefe  ueber  die  christliche  Religion  which  appeared  shortly 
before  the  outbreak  of  the  Franeo-Prussian  war  in  1870  under 
the  pseudonym  F.  A.  Mueller.  In  this  work  von  Hartmann  will 
show,  among  other  things,  that  both  the  personality  and  teach¬ 
ing  of  Jesus  are  a  much  too  narrow  foundation  for  the  erection 
of  a  religious  structure  (S.  15). 

Von  Hartmann  rejects  the  teaching  of  Jesus  on  ethical 
grounds.  Jesus,  as  the  Baptist,  was  a  decided  pessimist;  his  was 
not  the  metaphysical  pessimism  of  Buddhism,  but  an  Entrues- 
tungspessimismus  (S.  86).  Jesus  is  the  world’s  most  deter¬ 
mined  pessimist,  not  only  in  an  ethical,  but  in  a  physical  sense. 
His  optimism  is  transcendental  (S.  130).  Moreover,  Jesus’ 
ethics  are  purely  plebeian ;  they  not  only  exclude  the  aristocrats 
of  social  standing,  property  and  fortune,  but  even  the  aristo¬ 
cratic  select  spirits.  There  is  an  anti-Semitic  tone  running 
throughout  von  Hartmann’s  book;  Jesus  was  a  Jew  from  head 
to  foot  and  was  not  free  from  the  characteristic  semitischen 
Rohheit  ( Semitic  coarseness) . 

The  personal  and  private  ethics  of  Jesus  are  primitive  and 
have  long  since  been  outgrown  by  cultured  civilization.  He 
taught  the  control  of  conduct  with  the  outlook  for  recompense 


10 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


in  terms  of  rewards  and  punishments.  This  von  Hartmann  de¬ 
scribes  as  a  moral  doctrine  devoid  of  ethical  character  and  the 
immorality  of  pseudo-morals  (S.  123f).  The  two  great  com¬ 
mandments  (Me  12,28ff)  are  in  no  wise  original  with  Jesus 
but  were  adopted  by  him  from  Deut.  6,  Iff.  The  Golden  Rule 
(Mt  7,12)  Jesus  borrowed  from  Hillel;  as  an  ethical  principle 
of  conduct  it  is  injurious:  Understood  as  motive  the  instruc¬ 
tion  concerning  the  reciprocity  of  services  rendered  is  an  un¬ 
couth  Philistine  morality  •which  may  he  very  useful  in  practical 
life  hut  which  goes  straight  to  the  door  of  the  most  prudently 
calculating  egotism  and  injures  true  ethical  sentiment  (S.  134). 
Jesus’  idea  of  God  is  too  thoroughly  Old  Testament  and  can¬ 
not  be  accepted  today  because  it  belongs  to  a  period  when  the 
moral  conscience  was  coarse  and  undeveloped,  and  it  naturally 
bears  the  features  of  the  primitive  stage  of  culture  from  which 
it  comes.  Jesus,  further,  requires  the  individual  to  renounce  all 
insistance  upon,  or  claim  of,  personal  rights  (Mt  5,39f).  In 
Mt  18,16-18  Jesus  sets  in  the  place  of  state  justice  the  lynch 
justice  of  the  democratic  community. 

Yon  Hartmann  finds  that  Jesus’  social  ethics  are  just  as 
inadequate  as  his  personal  and  private  ethics.  He  demands  the 
renunciation  of  earthly  goods  and  expropriation ;  property  and 
economy  are  foolishness  and  crime,  nevertheless  he  does  not  hes¬ 
itate  to  accept  from  ministering  women  gifts  over  which  they 
had  no  rightful  legal  disposition,  and  to  destroy  a  herd  of  swine 
that  belonged  to  a  third  person  which  today  would  have  brought 
a  suit  in  court  for  indemnity.  He  shared  the  primitive  Jewish 
view  of  labor  as  a  curse  upon  mankind  and  had  no  appreciation 
of  the  dignity  of  labor  such  as  the  modern  world  has,  which  not 
only  punishes  shiftless  vagabondage  and  hegging ,  hut  in  so  far 
as  possible  the  giving  of  alms  to  the  unemployed  capable  of 
work,  and  which  would  convert  all  aid  into  insurance  (S.  50). 
Jesus  broke  with  his  own  family  and  not  only  permitted  but 
encouraged  others  to  do  the  same ;  nowhere  do  we  read  that  he 
told  the  women  in  his  following  to  go  back  to  their  homes  and 
husbands.  Then  von  Hartmann  concludes :  He  who  regards 
the  world  simply  as  a  waiting-room  and  sees  the  true  home  of 
man  exclusively  in  the  other  world,  his  teaching,  frankly  spok- 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


11 


en,  can  be  nothing  other  than  destructive  for  all  those  institu¬ 
tions  founded  upon  the  contrary  supposition  that  man  should 
strive  to  make  himself  at  home  in  the  world  and  be  comfortable 
here  (S.  158). 

Von  Hartmann’s  rejection  of  the  personality  of  Jesus  as 
a  sufficiently  firm  foundation  for  the  construction  of  the  relig¬ 
ious  life  of  the  modern  world  is  the  principal  point  of  inter¬ 
est  with  him  in  our  present  problem  of  the  psychic  health  of 
Jesus. 

In  the  first  place,  Jesus’  personality  cannot  constitute  a 
religious  standard  for  modern  life  because  the  sources  furnish 
a  too  inadequate  picture  of  Jesus:  The  historical  Jesus  remains 
for  us  ever  a  problematic  figure  about  whom  we  can  make  only 
more  or  less  doubtful  conjectures ;  what  we  can  say  of  him  with 
any  degree  of  probability  amounts  to  an  extremely  meagre  sub¬ 
ject-matter  with  which ,  from  the  religious  point  of  view ,  noth¬ 
ing  is  to  be  done  (S.  20).  In  his  determination  of  the  most  re¬ 
liable  materials,  von  Hartmann  sets  the  principle  which  P.  W. 
Schmiedel  followed  in  the  selection  of  his  “Grundsaeule”  in  the 
historicity  debate :  Positive  features  of  the  historical  Jesus  we 
shall  recognize  preferably  in  those  elements  which  have  sur¬ 
vived  independently  or  even  in  contradiction  to  the  doctrinal 
conceptions  of  the  original  documents  by  the  unperceived  law  of 
continuity  and  the  naive  faithfulness  of  epic  tradition  (S.  20). 
This  principle  of  selection  naturally  brings  von  Hartmann  up¬ 
on  those  more  distinctly  human  features  of  Jesus,  more  espe¬ 
cially  characteristic  of  Me,  which  lend  themselves  most  readily 
to  the  pathographic  point  of  view. 

Intellectually  Jesus  was  a  mediocre  mind.  His  teaching, 
for  the  most  part,  is  made  up  of  a  selection  of  materials  already 
taught  or  preached  by  the  old  prophets,  John  the  Baptist,  the 
order  of  the  Essenes,  the  Talmud,  or  the  Old  Testament  Apo¬ 
crypha.  Further,  Jesus’  selection  is  not  always  the  most  for¬ 
tunate  for  he  does  not  select  the  best.  Jesus’  own  independent 
productions  are  not  better  than  mediocre.  The  much  admired 
moral  aphorisms  are  only  citations  or  revisions  of  Old  Testa¬ 
ment  and  Talmudic  matter. 

Jesus’  parables  show  no  originality  either  in  form  or  con- 


12 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


tent,  and  are  often  very  inferior  to  those  of  the  great  Jewish 
rabbis.  The  sources  from  which  Jesus  drew  most  of  his  parables 
are  unknown,  but  this  does  not  let  us  conclude  that  they  are  his 
own  original  productions.  Some  of  them  are  really  very  -finely 
felt  and  crystal-clear ,  as  for  example  Lc  10,29-37 ;  15,11-32 
and  18,10-13  (S.  44).  But  Mt  13,3-8;  13,12-23  and  18,22- 
34  manifest  neither  specially  ingenious  nor  poetic  originality, 
but  for  the  most  part  only  a  fortunate  choice  and  skillful  com¬ 
bination  of  pictures  (S.  45).  Then  comes  a  longer  series  of 
short  parables  which  in  no  respect  transcend  the  niveau  of  med¬ 
iocrity,  in  which  one  finds  as  little  to  praise  as  to  blame  (S.  45). 
Many  (Mt  9,16-17;  12,33;  Lc  15,8-9;  12,37)  are  trivial. 
Von  Hartmann  has  so  little  understanding  of  the  parable  as  a 
form  of  address  as  to  call  Jn  10,1-16  a  parable  which  no  genius 
would  have  stooped  to  speak  and  so  illogically  thought  out  as 
to  have  one  character  alternately  play  the  part  of  shepherd,  the 
door  of  the  sheep,  and  then  the  shepherd  again.  Jesus  often 
violates  the  very  principle  of  the  parable  b}^  representing  a 
scene  that  is  unnatural  or  contrary  to  historical  fact,  viz.,  the 
parable  of  the  wise  and  foolish  virgins.  In  the  parable  of  the 
pounds  (?),  Mt  25,14-30,  the  point  in  the  illustration  itself  is 
miscarried,  in  that  the  servant  who  brings  back  the  original  sum 
intact  is  condemned  and  the  twx)  immoral  profiteers  are  praised. 
A  sure  murk  of  the  intellectual  ability  of  a  man  is  this :  whether 
he  improves  or  impairs  materials  which  he  finds  in  a  certain 
form  and  adopts  (S.  46).  Jesus  did  not  improve  upon  the  bor¬ 
rowed  materials  which  he  employed;  for  example,  the  Talmudic 
parallel  to  the  parable  of  the  wise  and  foolish  virgins  is  much 
clearer  and  less  offensive  to  our  taste  than  the  Christian  form 
in  Mt  25,1-12.  The  two  parables  in  Lc  11,5-8  and  18,1-7  not 
only  show  bad  taste,  but  a  high  degree  of  impropriety  (S.  47). 

In  the  matter  of  dialectic  Jesus  could  have  learned  much 
from  the  Jewish  schools  of  his  day,  if  this  had  not  been  so 
strongly  repugnant  to  his  intuitively  fanatical  disposition 
(S.  48).  Jesus  was  by  nature  too  unargumentative  and  unre- 
flective  to  engage  in  longer  discussion  and  discourse;  he,  there¬ 
fore,  confines  himself  to  gnomes  and  parables  without  once  at¬ 
tempting  to  give  a  rational  reason  for  his  position.  When  he 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


13 


is  forced  to  debate,  he  comes  out  either  by  side-stepping  the  issue 
or  by  uttering  some  sophism.  Jesus’  defense  in  Mt  12,27  is 
unsound ;  of  this  Jesus  himself  is  aware,  for  he  turns  to  a  per¬ 
sonal  attack  on  his  opponents  to  save  himself.  His  argumenta¬ 
tion  in  Mt  22,  31f  is  weak  and  unconvincing.  To  the  precise 
questions  of  Nicodemus  in  Jn  3, Iff  Jesus  gives  no  precise  reply, 
but  indulges  in  a  monologue  not  at  all  pertinent  to  the  issue 
presented. 

Jesus’  intellectual  abilities  could  not  have  given  him  the 
success  he  had.  His  unusual  oratorical  power  could  not  have 
done  it.  He  could  not  have  won  Iris  followers  without  the  charm 
of  an  imposing  and  winning  personality  (S.  49)  ;  lie  must  have 
possessed  personally  something  uncommonly  binding.  That 
with  which  he  won  hearts ,  roused  admiration  and  confidence , 
was  above  all  else  the  comforting  gospel  of  the  Baptist  that  the 
end  of  the  people's  suffering  was  at  hand ,  the  fanatical  glow  of 
his  enthusiasm  and  the  stirring  warmth  of  sentient  expression 
with  which  he  knew  how  to  accredit  his  message ,  and  a  sugges¬ 
tive  power  of  personal  appearance  and  demeanor  by  which  he 
accomplished  his  miracles  of  healing  (S.  71). 

The  constituency  of  the  personnel  of  his  following  ac¬ 
counts  for  a  great  deal  of  Jesus’  success ;  the  greater  part  of  it 
teas  made  up  of  eccentric  persons ,  epileptic  and  insane ,  in  part 
too  perhaps  of  such  as  believed  themselves  healed  by  him  (S. 
49).  Then  von  Hartmann  states  the  advice  that  Jesus  would 
receive  were  he  living  today:  According  to  our  present-day 
conclusions  in  psychology  and  psychiatry  a  healthy  religion 
cannot  grow  on  such  a  morbid  soil ,  and  today  we  would  give  a 
religious  reformer  or  prophet  the  advice  to  eliminate  in  so  far 
as  possible  such  elements  from  his  following ,  since  they  can  com¬ 
promise  only  too  easily  both  himself  and  his  cause  (S.  49f). 

Another  element  that  contributed  to  the  success  of  Jesus 
is  to  be  found  in  the  general  religious  restlessness  and  the  fev¬ 
erish  Messianic  expectations  of  the  time.  The  social  and  nation¬ 
al  depression  under  which  the  Jewish  people  groaned  had 
aroused  the  popular  fancy  to  a  high  pitch.  It  is  not  at  all  sur¬ 
prising  that  it  would  occur  to  some  insane  person  that  he  was 
the  Messiah  (S.  55).  To  believe  one's  self  the  Messiah  was  in 


14 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


the  very  atmosphere  of  the  time  like  a  kind  of  epidemic  idea 
(S.  67).  Messianic  claimants  were  numerous,  and  it  is  against 
these  possible  rivals  that  Jesus  warns  his  disciples  in  Mt 
24,23ff  (Me  13,21ff ;  Lc  17,22ff). 

It  is  von  Hartmann’s  delineation  of  the  consciousness  and 
character  of  Jesus  that  forms  his  chief  point  of  interest  for  us 
in  the  earlier  stages  of  the  problem  of  Jesus’  psychic  health. 

During  the  first  part  of  his  public  career  Jesus  seems  al- 
inost  an  impersonal  being  (S.  63).  His  message  is  so  thor¬ 
oughly  objective  that  his  own  person  plays  no  part  in  it  and 
he  seems  to  regard  himself  as  only  an  indifferent  instrument . 
During  this  period  Jesus  is  only  the  prophet  of  the  imminent 
world-catastrophe  and  the  approaching  kingdom  of  God.  Even 
in  the  second  period  he  does  not  yet  possess  his  Messianic  con¬ 
sciousness.  Nevertheless,  at  the  end  of  the  first  period  the  idea 
begins  to  strike  root ;  he  hints  at  it  and  seeks  confirmation  by 
public  and  private  opinion  in  the  second  period.  The  fanatical 
female  element  in  his  following  was  doubtless  the  first  factor  to 
encourage  Jesus  in  the  thought  of  his  Messiahship :  There  is 
nothing  more  probable  than  that  it  was  these  woman  who ,  if 
they  did  not  awaken  in  Jesus  the  idea  of  his  Messiahship ,  at 
least  nourished  it  and  by  their  idolizing  hopes  caused  it  to  strike 
root  (S.  49).  In  the  last  period  of  his  public  career  he  begins 
to  lay  aside  his  former  reserve ;  Mt  12  is  full  of  his  exaggerated 
self-exaltation.  With  the  entry  into  Jerusalem  his  personal 
estimate  of  himself  is  aggravated  according  to  the  measure  of 
the  demonstrations  in  his  honor  (S.  65).  The  anointing  in 
Bethany  augments  this  feeling.  During  his  Jerusalem  days  he 
falls  into  a  condition  of  abnormal  aggravation  of  self-con¬ 
sciousness  (S.  66).  The  nearer  he  comes  to  the  end  of  his  life, 
according  to  the  Synoptics,  the  stronger  his  Messianic  ambition 
appears  as  the  decisive  motive  of  his  action.  Then,  as  he  saw 
death  approaching,  he  summed  up  the  results  of  his  life,  saw 
his  work  wrecked,  his  person  and  cause  deserted  of  God,  and 
died  with  the  unanswered  question  on  his  lips,  why  God  had 
forsaken  him  (S.  74).  His  belief  in  his  Messiahship  was  only 
a  fanatical  fiction  to  which  he  had  committed  himself. 

In  his  estimate  of  Jesus’  character  we  come  to  von  Hart- 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


15 


mann’s  pathological  judgment  against  Jesus  which,  as  we  shall 
see  at  once,  is  much  more  severe  than  that  of  Strauss. 

Jesus  taught  humility  and  meekness  and  he  was  in  general 
certainly  a  gentle  and  quiet  nature;  for  the  same  reason  he  was 
also,  in  the  main,  eine  unpraktische  Natur  (S.  68).  His  meek¬ 
ness  was  by  no  means  a  merit,  for  if  was  natural  to  his  person¬ 
ality  ;  but  it  swung  immediately  into  fierce  energy  and  implac¬ 
able  exasperation  whenever  he  encountered  serious  opposition 
to  the  realization  of  his  fundamental  idea  (S.  68f).  This  is 
seen  in  Lc  12,f9ff,  Mt  23,19  33,  and  in  the  cursing  of  the 
fig  tree  where,  if  historical  (it  might  be  a  miracle  variation  of 
the  parable  in  Lc  13,6-9),  his  anger  shows  itself  capable  of 
haring  up  on  a  very  harmless  occasion  and  venting  itself  in  a 
most  uncritical  way  on  an  innocent  object  (S.  69). 

In  his  summary  sketch  of  Jesus’  personality  von  Hartmann 
writes :  Not  a  genius ,  but  a  talented  individual ,  who  with  com¬ 
plete  lack  of  genuine  culture  produced  on  an  average  only  mod¬ 
erate  materials  and  who  was  not  able  to  guard  himself  against 
numerous  weaknesses  and  grave  aberrations ;  a  quiet  fanatic 
and  a  transcendental  enthusiast,  who  in  spite  of  a  natural  gen¬ 
iality  hated  and  despised  the  world  and  its  concerns  and  looked 
upon  every  interest  for  it  as  injurious  to  the  one  true  transcen¬ 
dent  al  interest;  an  amiable  youth,  who  through  a  curious  chain 
of  circumstances  arrived  at  the  then  epidemic  idea  that  he  was 
the  Messiah  and  perished  in  consequence  of  it  (S.  72). 

Von  Hartmann  does  not  completely  reject  every  feature 
in  Jesus’  personality:  Certainly  one  can  exhibit  many  features 
of  the  personality  of  Jesus  which  even  today  can  serve  as  models 
(S.  70),  viz.,  his  piety  and  his  resignation  to  the  divine  will. 
But  in  order  to  be  an  ethical  example,  all,  and  not  just  some, 
of  the  features  of  a  personality  must  be  faultless.  Evolution 
itself  eliminates  Jesus  as  a  religious  ideal  for  the  modem  world; 
each  age  must  seek  its  moral  ideal  in  itself  and  not  in  another, 
and  Jesus  belongs  to  another  age  long,  long  in  the  past  and 
completely  outgrown. 

Strauss  pronounced  Jesus  a  fanatic  ( Schwaermer )  ;  von 
Hartmann  is  more  specific  in  his  definition  and  more  severe  in  his 
judgment.  He  designates  Jesus  as  a  stiller  Fanatiker  und 


16 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


transzendenter  Schwaermer ,  to  whom  the  fortunate  fate  was  al¬ 
lotted  of  appearing  in  history  in  an  uncultured  time  and  among 
an  uncultured  people  that  prepared  for  him  as  a  religious  fan¬ 
atic  only  a  tragic  end.  Modern  society  would  have  been  more 
merciful,  and  vet  more  merciless,  and  consigned  him  to  that  con- 
finement  and  care  which  would  have  precluded  all  possibility  of 
subsequent  influence. 

Yon  Hartmann  thus  closes  his  chapter  on  the  personality 
of  Jesus:  Man  kann  es  als  ein  glue  Miches  Vorrecht  jener  un~ 
gebildeten  Zeiten  und  Voelker  preisen,  dass  sie  solchem  religi- 
oesen  Schwaermer  zcenigstens  ein  tragisches  Ende  ermoeglicliten; 
die  moderne  Kultur  wuerde  Him  bloss  ein  trauriges  Los  bereit- 
en ,  das  jede  N achwirkung  ausschloesse  (S.  74). 

4)  Friedrich  Nietzsche 

Nietzsche's  Also  Sprach  Zarathustra  (Thus  Spake  Zara- 
thustra)  is,  in  reality,  a  contrary  counterpart  to  the  Gospels 
themselves,  or  better  perhaps  to  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  The 
book  is  composed  chiefly  of  addresses  by  Zarathustra ,  but  these 
are  interspersed  with  bits  of  transition  narratives  that  often 
read  as  though  they  were  modelled  after  the  narrative  matter 
of  the  Gospels.  These  narrative  bits,  however,  are  introduced 
only  as  they  furnish  a  setting  for,  or  make  some  sort  of  con¬ 
tribution  to  the  discourse  materials. 

In  fact,  Nietzsche  fashioned  his  presentation  of  the  career 
of  Zarathustra  after  the  course  of  the  public  career  of  Jesus. 
The  very  first  line  of  the  book  tells  us  that  Zarathustra ,  as 
Jesus,  entered  upon  his  public  career  when  he  was  thirty  years 
of  age  (Lc  3,23).  He  leaves  his  home  and  the  sea  of  his  child¬ 
hood  and  goes  into  the  mountains  where  he  spends  ten  years  in¬ 
stead  of  forty  days  as  Jesus  did;  Jesus  came  out  of  the  wilder¬ 
ness  too  soon.  At  the  end  of  this  period  he  enters  upon  his  pub¬ 
lic  career  during  which  he,  as  Jesus,  makes  his  frequent  retreats 
to  solitude,  not  for  prayer  but  for  meditation.  He  early  draws 
and  retains  unto  himself  disciples,  who,  in  so  far  as  possible, 
are  his  constant  companions  and  whom  he  instructs  concerning 
the  superman,  who  forms  as  constant  a  theme  in  Zarathustra1  s 
message  as  does  the  kingdom  of  God  in  the  preaching  of  Jesus. 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


17 


In  the  course  of  his  career  Zarathustra  goes  through  a  very 
highly  symbolic  and  imaginary  itinerary ;  he  visits  the  city 
called  “Die  bunte  Kith"  and  the  isles  of  the  blessed.  He  pro¬ 
nounces  his  woe  over  Die  grosse  Stadt  as  Jesus  does  over  the 
Galilean  cities  (Mt  ll,20ff ;  Lc  10,13ff).  His  favorite  re¬ 
treat  is  a  mount  of  olives  and  toward  the  close  he  democrati¬ 
cally,  yet  very  exclusively,  celebrates  a  last  meal  with  his  dis¬ 
ciples  and  a  few  other  trusted  and  sympathetic  friends.  But 
Nietzsche’s  Zarathustra  does  not  die;  his  hour  comes  but  in  the 
form  of  a  moment  of  transfiguration  in  which  he  grasps  the 
greatest  of  all  truths,  suffering  with  the  superman.  Darkness 
does  not  cover  the  earth  at  midday  (Me  15,33)  and  his  last  cry 
is  not  My  God,  My  God,  Why  hast  thou  forsaken  me?,  but  he 
goes  forth  from  his  den  to  his  work  in  the  world  with  the  strength 
and  glory  of  the  rising  sun  and  issuing  his  challenge,  This  is 
my  morning;  my  day  approaches ;  come,  come,  thou  great  noon¬ 
day  (S.  476).  It  is  Zarathustra  who  really  lives;  it  is  God  who 
is  dead. 

Nietzsche’s  book  is,  in  reality,  a  condensation  and  crystal- 
ization  of  a  spiritual  struggle  that  waged  in  his  day  and  lands 
in  the  souls  of  many  of  his  contemporaries,  and  which  he  felt 
with  special  keenness :  the  struggle  of  the  individual  against  the 
whole.  Nietzsche  hated  Christianity,  as  he  conceived  it,  because 
it  tended  to  institutionalize  the  individual.  He  regarded  Chris¬ 
tianity,  therefore,  as  the  sickness  of  humanity.  Jesus  preached 
an  ideal  community,  the  kingdom  of  God;  but  Zarathustra 
preaches  the  ideal  individual,  the  superman. 

As  Weiriel  writes,  Nietzsche’s  philosophy  is  the  history  of 
his  own  life  (IBN,  S.  143)  ;  we  might  add  that  his  Zarathustra 
is  his  psychological  autobiography.  For  many  years  Nietzsche 
suffered  fearfully  with  stomach  trouble,  excessive  nervousness 
and  weak  eyes.  And  before  he  had  finished  the  last  part  of  his 
Zarathustra  (1884)  his  brain  and  mind  had  become  seriously 
affected.  His  thought  came  thus  to  center  about  the  two  op¬ 
posite  poles  of  health  and  sickness,  except  as  it  flashed  bril¬ 
liantly  back  and  forth  between  them.  It  would  seem  only  nat¬ 
ural,  then,  that  the  question  of  Jesus’  health  would  suggest  it¬ 
self  to  Nietzsche;  and  it  did,  but  not  in  the  1905—  form  of  the 


18 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


question.  It  was  the  ethical  and  moral  teaching  of  Jesus  that 
Nietzsche  found  to  be  morbid. 

More  than  all  else  Nietzsche  wanted  what  nature  had  de¬ 
nied  him :  to  be  healthy,  strong,  able  to  work  in  the  world,  and 
to  do  in  a  splendid  superhuman  way.  Above  all  else  he  wanted 
to  really  live  and  enjoy  life.  And  he  was  impatient  with  what 
he  found  in  the  Gospels  to  be  Jesus’  low  estimate  of  this  life 
and  his  hatred  for  this  world.  Jesus  was  constantly  pointing 
his  followers  to  the  life  of  another  world  and  order  of  things, 
the  kingdom  of  God.  Therefore,  Nietzsche  has  Z arathustra 
say: 

I  implore  you,  my  brethren,  remain  true  to  the 
earth,  and  believe  them  not  who  speak  to  you  of  su¬ 
permundane  hopes!  They  are  mixers  of  poison  whether 
they  know  it  or  not. 

They  are  despisers  of  life,  paralyzed  and  them¬ 
selves  poisoned,  of  whom  the  earth  is  tired;  may  they 
pass  away  (S.  13). 

Jesus  and  Christianity  had  stripped  all  the  joy  out  of  life. 
In  his  address  at  the  last  supper  Z arathustra  asks,  What  has 
been  hitherto  the  greatest  sin  here  on  earth?  Was  it  not  the 
word  of  him  who  said  'Woe  unto  them  who  laugh 9  (Lc  6,25. 
S.  427).  Nietzsche’s  chief  objection  to  Jesus  was  that  he  never 
learned  to  laugh.  If  Jesus  found  no  occasion  to  laugh  he  sought 
badly ;  even  a  child  finds  reason  to  laugh.  Jesus  did  not  love 
enough,  for  he  did  not  love  those  who  laugh.  Instead  he  pro¬ 
nounced  woes  on  them.  This  for  Nietzsche  is  a  lapse  of  taste 
on  the  part  of  Jesus,  but  only  to  be  expected  for  Jesus  came 
from  the  proletariat.  Z arathustra  admonishes  his  hearers  to 
avoid  all  such  teachers  : 

Avoid  all  such  uncompromising  persons!  They 
are  a  miserable  morbid  kind,  a  rabble  class ;  they  look 
upon  this  life  as  bad,  they  have  an  evil  eye  for  this 
earth  (S.  427). 

Nietzsche  thus  finds  something  morbid,  not  in  the  mind  and 
person  of  Jesus,  but  in  his  view  of  the  world  and  his  spirit  of 
living  life.  He  is  offended  at  Jesus’  teaching  concerning  life’s 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


19 


ideals ;  and  this,  as  Weinel  says,  made  Nietzsche  the  strongest 
enemy  of  Christianity. 

Nietzsche  does  not  regard  Jesus’  teaching  as  the  product 
of  his  morbid  state  of  mind,  but  of  his  youthful  immaturity. 
Jesus  died  too  soon;  his  mind  was  not  yet  ripe  for  public  in¬ 
struction  on  life’s  ideals.  Jesus  had  not  been  alone  with  him¬ 
self  enough;  he  was  in  the  wilderness  only  forty  days.  Z ara- 
thustra  remained  ten  years  in  his  first  retreat  to  the  mountains 
without  becoming  tired.  Many  die  too  late,  and  some  die  too 
soon;  therefore  Z arathustra  teaches,  “ Die  at  the  right  time ” 
(S.  105).  Jesus  was  one  of  those  few  who  die  too  soon,  for  his 
death  prevented  him  from  retracting  his  teaching. 

Of  a  truth,  too  soon  died  that  Hebrew,  whom  the 
preachers  of  stoic  death  honor;  and  since  it  has  been 
fateful  for  many  that  he  died  too  soon. 

Then  he  knew  only  the  tears  and  melancholy  of 
the  Hebrew,  together  with  the  hatred  against  the 
good  and  the  righteous, — the  Hebrew  Jesus;  then  the 
yearning  for  death  overtook  him. 

If  he  had  only  remained  in  the  wilderness,  and 
far  from  the  good  and  the  righteous !  Perhaps  he 
would  have  learned  to  live  and  to  love  the  earth — and 
to  laugh  besides! 

Believe  me,  my  brethren!  He  died  too  soon;  he 
himself  would  have  retracted  his  teaching  if  he  had 
lived  to  my  age!  (It  is  interesting  to  note  that  Nietz¬ 
sche  was  only  thirty-eight  years  old  when  he  wrote 
this).  He  was  noble  enough  to  retract! 

But  he  was  still  immature.  Prematurely  the 
youth  loves,  and  prematurely  he  hates  both  man  and 
earth.  His  soul  and  the  wings  of  his  spirit  were  still 
tied  and  heavy. 

In  the  man  there  is  more  child  than  in  the  youth, 
and  less  melancholy;  he  understands  himself  better 
with  regard  to  death  and  life  (S.  lOTf). 

Nietzsche  was  not  without  admiration  for  Jesus;  he  could 
call  him  noble  enough  to  retract.  In  fact,  he  felt  great  sym¬ 
pathy  with  much  in  Jesus’  character  and  expressed  the  regret 


20 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


that  the  proper  person  had  not  known  and  been  with  him  who 
would  have  understood  and  helped  him.  It  is  to  be  regretted 
that  a  Dostojewsky  did  not  live  near  this  interesting  decadent; 
I  mean  some  one  who  would  have  known  how  to  appreciate  the 
captivating  charm  of  such  a  mixture  of  the  sublime ,  jnorbid,  and 
childish  (Quoted  by  Weinel,  IBN,  S.  149). 

5)  Jules  Soury 

Soury  (1),  one  time  secretary  to  Renan,  is  the  first  to 
make  a  definite  diagnosis  of  the  psychic  malady  of  Jesus. 
Jesus  was  a  case  of  progressive  paralysis  of  the  brain. 
He  opens  his  preface  thus:  Apres  le  dieu  et  Vhomrne , 
le  malade  (p.  5).  Since  the  work  of  Strauss  and  Renan 
there  remains  of  Jesus  but  the  sinister  shadow  of  a  suf¬ 
ferer.  Jesus  appears  here  for  the  first  time  as  a  morbid  mind 
of  which  one  attempts  to  trace  the  development  of  the  disease 
(p.  6).  The  nervous  trouble  with  which  Jesus  was  afflicted  was 
very  serious,  in  fact  incurable.  This  disease  has  never  been 
idle;  it  has  produced  millionaires,  kings,  popes,  prophets,  and 
even  gods  of  poor  devils  ( diables )  with  disordered  brains.  It 
has  produced  more  than  one  Messiah.  The  study  of  morbid 
psychology  demonstrates  that  the  founder  of  the  Christian  re¬ 
ligion  died  in  a  more  or  less  advanced  stage  of  this  disease ; 
the  cross  saved  him  from  complete  insanity. 

Soury  proposes  to  conduct  his  investigation  on  the  basis 
of  three  orders  of  fact  as  attested  by  the  oldest  and  most  re- 
liable  witnesses  of  the  life  of  Jesus.  1)  The  exalted  religious 
sentiment,  then  general  in  Galilee,  drove  Jesus  into  the  wilder¬ 
ness  of  Judea  where  he  for  a  time  lived  the  ascetic  life  of  a 
prophet.  Dominated  by  Videe  fixe  that  he  was  called  to  an¬ 
nounce  the  Messiah,  he  left  his  family  and  native  Ullage,  where 
he  was  little  more  respected  than  in  his  own  home,  and,  followed 
by  a  few  fishermen,  he  went  about  through  the  cities  and  Ul¬ 
lages  of  Galilee  announcing  the  imminent  approach  of  the  king¬ 
dom  of  God.  2)  Little  by  little  Jesus  came  to  the  belief  that 
he  himself  was  the  very  Messiah  he  had  been  announcing.  The 

(1)  J6sns  et  les  Evangiles,  (1878,  190  p.)  The  writer  is  indebted  to 
the  Public  Librarv  of  the  City  of  Boston  for  access  to  this  now  rare  edition 
of  Sourv’s  work. 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


21 

progressive  swooning  away  of  his  natural  self-consciousness  can 
be  detected  from  the  time  of  the  incident  at  the  foot  of  Mt. 
Hermon  until  the  day  when  he  boldly  declared  himself  to  be  the 
Messiah  before  Caiaphas  and  Annas.  3)  His  cursing  of  the 
fig  tree,  when  it  was  not  the  season  of  figs,  and  his  violent 
cleansing  of  the  temple  are  manifestly  absurd  acts.  During 
this  period  Jesus’  self-consciousness  rose  to  the  point  where  he 
believed  that  he  was  permitted  to  do  anything  and  that  nothing 
was  impossible  for  him.  For  a  long  time  Jesus  had  manifested 
a  clear  perversion  of  natural  sentiment  and  affection,  especially 
in  regard  to  his  own  family.  His  fits  of  frenzy  against  the 
Jerusalem  authorities,  his  exaggerated  words  and  deeds,  his  de¬ 
lirium  of  his  Messiahship  were  followed  by  a  marked  decline  in 
his  mental  and  physical  faculties,  un  aff  aiblissement  intellectuel 
et  musculaire  (p.  10). 

In  each  of  these  periods  of  his  life  pathological  conditions 
of  Jesus’  constitution  can  be  discovered.  The  first  effect  was 
a  precipitation  of  the  course  of  the  blood,  an  abnormal  dilation 
of  the  blood  vessels,  and  a  congestion  of  the  brain.  Every 
chronic  congestion  of  this  organ  is  attended,  from  the  point  of 
view  of  the  subject,  at  first  by  an  intensely  moral  fife  and  an 
extraordinary  activity  of  the  imagination  rising  even  to  the 
point  of  hallucinations ;  later,  ideas  of  power  and  absurd  deliri¬ 
ous  delusions  of  grandeur  appear.  The  violence  and  irritabil¬ 
ity  of  aliens  is  then  very  great  (p.  11).  The  progress  of  the 
disease  is  rather  slow.  There  are  at  times  remissions  during 
which  the  reason  seems  to  return,  but  if  the  affliction  continues 
for  some  months  or  several  years  the  result  is  a  complete  intel¬ 
lectual  and  physical  debility.  That  is  how  Jesus  would  have 
ended  if,  evily  inspired ,  the  Jews  had  preferred  to  see  Barabbas 
on  the  cross  (p.  14).  This  meningo-encephalite  has  been  called 
the  sickness  of  our  century,  but,  since  it  has  a  moral  origin,  it 
is  the  disease  of  all  centuries.  Religious  and  political  passions 
were  no  less  active  in  Judea  then  than  in  our  own  lands.  Mes- 
sianism  spread  over  Palestine  in  Jesus’  day  like  an  epidemic ; 
Jesus  caught  this  mental  malady  and  died  of  it,  Voila  tout.  It 
is  probable  that  Jesus  was  predisposed  to  infection  because  he, 
in  all  probability,  came  from  a  tainted  family.  What  we  know 


22 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


of  his  brother  James  does  not  permit  us  to  doubt  this  much. 
One  third  of  the  cases  of  general  paralysis  are  due  to  heredity. 
One  would  suppose  that  there  were  maniacs ,  epileptics,  suicides 
or  drunkards  in  Jesus’  family.  He  was  wise  to  remain  as  chaste 
as  an  ascetic  (p.  18f). 

But  one  does  well  to  proceed  cautiously  in  consideration  of 
the  eminence  of  Jesus’  moral  faculties  and  religious  genius 
which  morbid  heredity  seems  able  to  admit.  Moreau  de  Tours 
writes :  The  dispositions  of  mind  which  enable  a  man  to  distin¬ 
guish  himself  above  other  men  by  the  originality  of  his  thought 
and  ideas,  by  his  eccentricity  and  thv  energy  of  his  affective 
faculties,  by  the  superiority  of  his  intellectual  faculties ,  have 
their  origin  in  the  same  organic  conditions  as  the  various  moral 
disorders  of  which  insanity  and  idiocy  are  the  most  complete 
manifestation  (quoted  by  Soury,  p.  19f).  It  is  often  the  case 
that  men  liable  to  states  of  ecstasy  and  hallucinations  have  most 
profoundly  modified  the  world’s  thought  and  influenced  the 
course  of  the  world’s  history.  The  historian  cannot  afford  to 
neglect  hallucinations,  for  a  confirmed  paranoiac  has  often 
proven  himself  capable  of  some  of  the  most  brilliant  feats  of 
the  human  mind. 

Soury  attempts  to  trace  the  evolution  and  maturity  of  the 
morbid  germs  that  lie  secreted  in  every  organism,  and  to  prove 
that  the  superior  manifestations  of  heart  and  mind  have  a  neu¬ 
ropathic  origin.  In  this  study  he  does  not  desire  to  grieve  or 
hurt  the  simple  soul  that  delights  to  devote  itself  to  the  ideal 
that  it  loves.  He  will  advance  no  hypothesis,  but  simply  point 
out  certain  features  in  the  character  and  personality  of  Jesus 
based  on  one  or  more  passages  of  the  Gospels.  Our  portrait  of 
Jesus  is  identical  with  that  of  the  Gospel  itself  (p.  26). 

The  Gospel  writers  picture  Jesus  as  a  morbid  mind.  His 
modern  biographers  have  not  perceived  this  for  the  simple 
re?  son  that  they  have  not  looked  for  it.  Today  when  Jesus  is 
no  longer  considered  divine,  but  merely  a  man,  he,  like  the  ma¬ 
jority  of  other  great  men,  is  for  the  historian  only  a  problem  in 
morbid  psychology.  Excellent  equilibrium  of  physiological 
functions  can  bestow  only  long  life  upon  us.  In  order  that  the 
genius  may  appear  it  is  necessary  that  this  equilibrium  be  brok¬ 
en  (p.  34). 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


23 


The  Galilean  prophet  was  not  always  of  a  sweet  and  even 
disposition ;  he  allowed  himself  to  be  seized  by  choleric  fits 
against  the  world  of  men  and  things.  He  was  often  rude  to¬ 
ward  the  sick  and  the  infirm  who  came  to  him  for  relief ;  noth¬ 
ing  equals  the  harshness  with  which  he  dismissed  those  whom 
he  had  cured.  Jesus  was  a  thaumaturge  or  he  was  nothing. 
(p.  128).  He  was  not  the  amiable  person  that  Renan  pictured, 
but  a  fanatical  and  visionary  Jewish  thaumaturge  subject  to  fits 
of  frightful  frenzy  and  violence.  In  our  day  he  would  be  ac¬ 
counted  insane.  But  it  is  in  the  malady  of  Jesus  that  the  finest 
features  of  his  personality  are  to  be  found. 

Jesus’  contemporaries,  even  his  own  family,  regarded  him 
as  insane.  So  must  we.  If  Mary  and  the  brethren  of  Jesus, 
when  they  came  from  Nazareth  to  Capernaum  to  fetch  him,  had 
brought  him  again  to  his  home  in  Nazareth,  the  Galilean  pro¬ 
phet  perhaps  would  have  passed  an  obscure  existence  in  some 
dark  corner  of  the  paternal  house  held  by  a  chain  as  was  the 
demoniac  of  Gadara. 

The  exasperated  state  of  Jesus’  mind  is  clear  in  his  wmes 
on  the  Galilean  cities,  in  the  subtilty  of  his  reasonings,  the  am¬ 
biguity  of  his  responses  when  he  was  put  with  questions,  and 
the  ruses  he  employed  in  escaping  the  hands  of  his  enemies. 
This  blending  of  intense  violence  and  instinctive  'prudence ,  of 
consummate  cleverness ,  although  unconscious ,  is  thoroughly 
characteristic  (p.  68). 

Jesus’  words  at  Caesarea  Philippi  have  all  the  indications 
of  the  state  of  those  who  are  already  in  the  way  of  general 
paralysis ;  this  delirium  of  his  Messiahship  was  born  of  his  in¬ 
tense  faith  in  his  prophetic  call  and  mission.  It  was  only  grad¬ 
ually  that  it  came  to  obscure  his  natural  personal  consciousness 
and  identity. 

His  Jerusalem  words  and  acts  are  pathological  in  charac¬ 
ter,  not  because  of  their  vehemence  and  violence,  but  because 
of  their  absurdity.  Being  in  the  advanced  stages  of  general 
paralysis,  Jesus  doubtless  took  the  mockings  of  the  Roman  sol¬ 
diers  in  all  seriousness.  Only  some  of  the  half-demented  women 
who  had  followed  him  up  from  Galilee  witnessed  his  execution. 


24 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


The  pathographic  part  of  Soury’s  book  is  confined  to  the 
preface  and  the  introduction;  in  the  subsequent  chapters  he 
hardly  touches  upon  the  question,  and  does  not  prove  what  he 
promised.  However,  it  is  interesting  to  note  that  Soury  anti¬ 
cipated  de  Loosten  and  Binet-Sangle  in  the  idea  that  Jesus  suf¬ 
fered  affliction  under  the  burden  of  morbid  hereditary  influences. 

In  the  third  edition  of  his  book  which  appeared  in  1898 
under  the  title  of  Jesus  et  la  Religion  dTsrael  Soury  entirely 
omits  the  pathographic  sections  of  the  first  edition  (1878)  and 
in  his  preface  expresses  his  regret  for  the  offense  caused  by  the 
first  appearance  of  his  book  (see  A.  Schweitzer,  GdLJF,  S. 
368). 

For  an  appreciation  of  Soury  and  a  refutation  of  his 
diagnosis — see  Binet-Sangle,  IV  311-320;  against  Soury  in 
particular  and  the  pathographic  position  in  general — see  Ninck, 
S.  230f,  245ff. 

6)  L.  K.  Washburn 

Washburn’s  pamphlet,  Was  Jesus  Insane ?,  hardly  deserves 
mention  in  the  discussion  of  our  present  problem,  for  it  is  too 
clear  in  its  purpose  and  too  uncritical  in  character  to  be  taken 
seriously  and  is  wholly  undeserving  of  criticism.  Though  he 
quotes  from  the  Gospels  a  number  of  times,  Washburn  cites 
only  four  references;  three  by  chapter  (Mt  23,  Me  8,  and  Jn 
8),  and  one  by  chapter  and  verse  (Lc  19,27).  (All  other  refer¬ 
ences  are  supplied  by  the  writer).  His  only  answer  to  the  ques¬ 
tion  as  he  states  it  in  the  title  of  his  pamphlet  is  cheap  rhetoric 
of  wrhich  the  following  is  a  characteristic  specimen:  To  be¬ 
lieve  this  (that  Jesus  was  divine),  we.  must  write  Imbecile  on 
the  brow ,  tell  truth  to  wear  the  mash  of  hypocrisy ,  bid  honesty 
put  out  its  sight,  lead  to  the  grave  the  shining  virtues  of  our 
race  and  drape  manhood  in  black.  Why,  the  very  majesty  of 
nature  must  crawl  in  the  dust  and  the  lips  of  truth  kiss  the  feet 
of  falsehood  (p.  16).  This  pamphlet  appeared  in  1889  and 
contains  only  18  small  pages  (1). 

(1)  It  is  out  of  print  and  the  writer  is  indebted  to  the  kindness  of  The 
Truth  Seeker  Company  in  New  York  for  lending  him  a  copy  from  its 
publication  files,  which  kindness  enables  him  here  to  survey  briefly  its 
contents. 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


25 


Washburn’s  complete  lack  of  orientation  in  the  study  of 
the  New  Testament  literature  is  seen  in  his  estimate  of  the 
sources.  The  accounts  of  Jesus  in  the  New  Testament  are  not 
to  be  depended  upon.  Thirty  years  intervened  between  the 
death  of  Jesus  and  the  time  when  the  earliest  Gospel  is  said  to 
have  been  written ;  but  it  is  by  no  means  certain  that  any 
account  of  Jesus  was  written  for  one  hundred  years  after  the 
time  of  his  death ,  and  if  an  account  was  written  it  is  impossible 
at  the  present  time  to  know  what  it  was  (p.  4).  To  assert  that 
the  gospel  account  of  what  Jesus  said  is  reliable ,  is  to  declare 
that  we  have  the  exact  words  which  he  spoke  and  a  faithful  de¬ 
scription  of  what  he  did . Common  report ,  hearsay ,  gos¬ 

sip ,  imagination,  furnished  the  writers  of  the  gospels  with  their 
materials  (p.  5).  We  see  how  mechanically  Washburn  con¬ 
ceives  of  tradition  when  he  says,  We  must  have  a  phonographic 
record  of  his  speeches  when  delivered  and  an  accurate  account 

of  his  acts  by  an  eye-witness .  Will  anyone  presume  to 

say  that  the  gospel  story  was  written  by  an  eye-witness,  or  that 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  the  parables,  and  the  exclamations 
of  Jesus  were  phono  graphically  reported ?  (p.  If).  Take  for 
example  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  Among  those  who  heard 
Jesus  do  you  think  there  was  one  who  would  be  able  to  repeat 
every  one  of  the  2,473  words  of  his  sermon  thirty  years  after¬ 
wards  exactly  as  it  was  delivered  (p.  5). 

It  is  not  Washburn’s  purpose  to  point  out  the  inconsistent 
and  contradictory  character  of  the  Gospels,  but  rather  to  hold 
up  the  picture  of  this  person  in  the  light  of  those  extravagant 
expressions  which  have  been  accepted  as  proof  of  his  divinity, 
but  which  seem  rather  to  indicate  his  insanity  (p.  6). 

Since  the  Gospels  are  completely  silent  on  physiological 
details,  we  can  judge  the  character  of  Jesus  only  by  his  speech 
and  behavior.  Let  us  see  what  Jesus  said  and  did,  and  find,  if 
we  can,  whether  a  God  once  lived  upon  the  earth,  or  whether  a 
man,  under  a  mental  delusion,  tried  to  play  the  part  of  a  god 
(p.  7). 

How  do  we  prove  a  person  insane?  Is  it  not  by  his  words 
and  acts,  by  what  he  says  and  what  he  does ?  If  a  person  uses 
foolish  and  extravagant  language,  if  he  performs  deeds  for 


26 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


which  can  he  offered  no  good  or  rational  excuse ,  he  is  adjudged 
insane.  Did  any  person  ever  make  use  of  a  more  irrational 
speech;  ever  put  forth  claims  to  more  preposterous  power; 
ever  utter  more  intemperate ,  insane  language ,  than  the  person 
called  Jesus  (p.  7).  The  world  seems  possessed  with  a  fear  of 
the  name  of  Jesus ;  this  is  moral  cowardice.  The  name  of  Jesus 
is  the  name  of  a  man,  and  it  was  a  name  that  was  quite  common 
in  the  time  of  Josephus.  It  is  a  name  that  we  need  speak  with 
no  particular  reverence  (p.  8). 

The  language  of  Jesus  is  not  sensible,  not  rational;  cer¬ 
tainly  not  the  language  of  a  sane  mind  (p.  8).  If  a  man  today 
about  whom  there  was  nothing  particularly  remarkable  should 
speak  the  words  that  Jesus  speaks  in  Jn  10,30,  we  would  say 
that  he  was  crazy,  and  every  medical  expert  in  the  United 
States  would  sign  a  certificate  of  his  insanity  (p.  9).  Such 
words  merely  mirror  the  moods  of  a  shattered  brain;  but  it  was 
easier  to  be  a  god  then  than  now. 

Jesus  was  only  an  ordinary  individual  so  far  as  his  earth¬ 
ly  surroundings  were  concerned,  and  we  might  think  that  we 
are  reading  von  Hartmann  again  when  Washburn  says  that 
Jesus  had  the  habits  of  the  lower  classes  (p.  10).  It  is  diffi¬ 
cult,  if  not  impossible,  to  account  for  the  extraordinary  career 
of  Jesus  upon  the  ground  of  sanity.  There  is  only  one  way  to 
explain  the  gospels — either  Jesus  was  insane  or  the  person  that 
wrote  his  life  was  (p.  10). 

It  is  generally  admitted  that  mentally  sane  persons  are 
not  easily  moved  to  anger  or  led  into  an  excited  condition 
which  expresses  itself  in  violent  speech  or  action  whenever  they 
encounter  opposition  or  contradiction.  (Here  we  have  an  an¬ 
ticipation  of  one  of  Rasmussen’s  points).  But  Jesus  denounces 
people  with  apparently  little  cause ;  this  cannot  be  reconciled 
with  his  own  teachings.  His  teaching  in  Lc  6,28  is  contra¬ 
dicted  by  Mt  10,33  and  Lc  12,51f  (Mt  10,31).  In  Mt  10, 
35f  (compare  Micah  7,6)  a  more  fiendish  mission  could  not 
have  been  undertaken;  it  is  the  scheme  of  a  madman  (P.  ii). 
He  pronounced  woes  on  the  cities  that  were  irresponsive  to  his 
teaching  (Mt  ll,20ff;  Lc  10,13ff).  He  raved  violently 
against  the  Pharisees  (Mt  23,1-36;  Lc  11,39-51).  Jesus 


EARLIER  STAGES  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


27 


could  not  brook  opposition  and  he  was  moved  to  anger  at  the 
slightest  pretext  (p.  11). 

Me  3,21  is  the  verdict  of  every  sensible  person  who  reads 
the  gospels  today,  and  had  this  verdict  of  the  friends  of  Jesus 
been  respected,  the  world  would  not  have  been  shrouded  in  the 
terrible  darkness  of  Christian  superstitions  for  over  a  thousand 
years  (p.  12).  Further,  a  great  many  meaningless  details  and 
expressions  in  the  Gospels  go  to  prove  that  Jesus  was  not  in 
his  right  mind,  Me  3,31-35  ;  Jn  2,1.  A  man  making  such  a 
foolish  statement  in  our  day  as  Jesus  made  in  Jn  8,56-58  could 
be  sent  to  the  insane  asylum;  wills  have  been  broken  with  less 
evidence  of  the  testator's  lunacy.  This  foolish  speech  of  Jesus 
ought  to  cost  the  Christian  world  all  respect  for  the  speaker's 
intelligence  (p.  Ilf).  It  is  no  wonder  that  Jesus  hid  himself 
(Jn  8,59)  after  making  such  a  statement. 

All  of  Jesus’  references  to  his  return  on  the  clouds  in  the 
role  of  the  Son  of  man  are  merely  the  utterances  of  an  unbal¬ 
anced  mind  (p.  11).  But  there  was  a  method  in  his  madness; 
his  mind  was  filled  with  the  idea  that  he  was  to  rule  the  world, 
and  any  means,  no  matter  how  cruel,  that  would  hasten  the  ful¬ 
filment  of  his  designs,  were  sacred  (p.  15).  His  delusion  con¬ 
cerning  his  Messiahship  is  the  faith  of  a  diseased  more  than  of 
a  rational  mind  (p.  17).  We  can  explain  his  Messianic  claim 
only  by  believing  that  he  was  insane. 

Then  Washburn  triumphantly  closes  his  eighteen-page  dis¬ 
cussion  of  the  insanity  of  Jesus  with  the  remark:  After  a  fair 
and  impartial  reading  of  the  gospels,  the  world  must  be  con¬ 
vinced  that  Jesus  was  not  divine,  but  insane  (p.  20). 

One  feels  bound  to  apologize  for  including  Washburn  in 
the  same  chapter  with  men  like  Strauss,  von  Hartmann  and 
Nietzsche,  for  these  men  struggled  with  real  problems  and  at¬ 
tempted  serious  solutions.  Washburn  deserves  mention  only 
because  we  aim  at  a  comprehensive  survey  of  the  literature  on 
the  subject  in  hand. 

However,  it  is  to  be  noted  that  Washburn,  in  spite  of  the 
tasteless  tone  that  dominates  his  pamphlet,  did  touch  very  di¬ 
rectly  upon  some  of  the  Gospel  passages  that  figure  promi¬ 
nently  in  the  1905—  pathographic  judgment  against  Jesus. 


28 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


(H.  J.  Holtzman,  MBJ,  S.  81,  Anm.  1,  cites  Albert  Dulk, 
Der  Irrgang  des  Lcbens  Jesu;  I.  Teil  395S.  1884,  II.  Teil  1885 
302S.,  as  figuring  in  the  pathographic  contention.  This  work 
was  not  accessible  to  the  writer.) 


CHAPTER  II 


Factors  Contributing  to  the  Rise  of  the  Problem 

1)  Philosophical 

It  is  our  general  world-view  that,  for  the  most  part,  justi¬ 
fies  our  judgments  and  determines  our  decisions  in  the  great 
majority  of  the  matters  of  life.  It  is  this  Weltawffassung  or 
Weltanschauung  that,  usually  unconsciously,  rises  as  a  kind  of 
subliminal  self  to  affect  the  formulations  of  our  thoughts  and 
the  guidance  of  our  conduct  in  any  particular  instance.  Our 
world-view  may  grow  and  develop  or  even  undergo  a  radical 
revolutionary  change  with  age  and  education.  But  we  never 
escape  it  entirely;  in  one  aspect  or  another,  it  sets  itself  before 
our  eyes  as  a  kind  of  invisible  colored  screen  through  which  we 
regard  the  world  and  life.  Nowhere  is  this  truer  than  in  the 
field  of  religion.  The  world-view  of  the  free-thinker  makes  his 
religious  ideas  and  attitudes  perfectly  natural  and  comfort¬ 
able  to  himself,  which  to  his  traditionally  orthodox  neighbor 
seem  shockingly  irreligious. 

World-view  has  played  an  important  role  in  the  patho- 
graphic  judgment  against  Jesus.  Naumann  regards  the  works 
of  Rasmussen  and  de  Loosten  as  the  inevitable  confirmation  of 
the  indications  of  the  modern  spiritual  barometer.  The  spirit¬ 
ual  atmosphere  responsible  for  the  charge  against  the  psychic 
soundness  of  Jesus  has  been  variously  analyzed.  Kneib  com¬ 
plains  against  the  modern  Willensrichtung  and  the  general  in¬ 
clination  toward  a  departure  from  the  long  accepted  Christian 
traditions.  He  says  that  religion  has  dwindled  down  to  relig¬ 
ious  psychology,  and  the  latter  to  psychopathology  which 
would  explain  religion  and  piety  as  a  degeneration.  Werner 
sees  in  the  modern  rejection  of  the  supernatural  element  in  re¬ 
ligion  and  the  substitution  of  a  naturalistic  interpretation  the 
underlying  cause  which  is  responsible  for  recent  judgments 

29 


30 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


passed  upon  the  emotions  and  experiences  of  the  religious  life 
as  abnormal  and  morbid  phenomena.  Naumann  finds  that  the 
answer  to  the  question  of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  is  de¬ 
pendent  upon  the  answer  to  a  much  more  general  question, 
namely :  Is  an  actual  contact  and  relation  between  the  finite  and 
the  infinite  possible?  If  the  answer  is  negative,  as  it  frequently 
has  been  in  recent  times,  then  Jesus  was  a  paranoiac.  Holl- 
mann  writes,  Fuer  die  Beurteilung  wird  hier  schliesslich  ent- 
scheidend  sein ,  ob  man  an  ein  Wirken  goettlichen  Geistes  im 
Menschengeist  glauben  kann;  S.  275. 

It  is  quite  essential  to  understand  the  world-view  of  those 
who  have  contested  the  sound  state  of  Jesus’  mind.  With  the 
coolest  conceivable  composure  de  Loosten,  Binet-Sangle  and 
Hirsch  pronounce  judgments  against  Jesus,  which  for  the  con¬ 
servative  Christian  conscience  are  the  blackest  blasphemy.  The 
ease  with  which  these  men  do  this  is  at  once  clear  when  one 
understands  their  materialistic,  atheistic  and  free-thinking 
viewpoints.  Rothenburg  and  Rasmussen  add  to  this  their  hat¬ 
red  for  Christianity  and  all  of  its  traditions.  The  latter  sees 
in  all  founders,  prophets  and  champions  of  religions  only  an¬ 
alogies  to  typical  cases  of  epilepsy ;  their  sincerity  and  serious¬ 
ness  is  not  to  be  doubted,  for  both  are  only  symptoms  of  their 
sickness.  Holtzmann’s  liberal  viewpoint  accounts  for  his  book; 
he  enjoys  the  ecstatic  element  in  Jesus,  for  liberal  theology  has 
always  been  fond  of  the  study  of  Jesus  in  the  light  of  psy¬ 
chology. 

The  best  designation  of  the  world-view  which  has  formed 
the  background  for  the  denial  of  Jesus’  psychic  health  has 
been  fortunately  framed  by  Professor  James  as  medical  mate¬ 
rialism.  By  medical  materialism  we  mean  that  view  of  mind 
which  regards  all  psychic  phenomena  as  purely  products  or 
phases  of  the  physical,  chemical,  or  electro-chemical  function¬ 
ings  of  the  brain.  Exceptional  psychic  appearances  are  at 
once  explained  by  the  assumption  of  nervous  disorders  or 
disease.  It  is  very  interesting  to  note  that  Professor  James 
(p.  13,  note  1)  cites  Dr.  Binet-Sangle  as  a  typical  represen¬ 
tative  of  this  medical  materialism  (Against  medical  material¬ 
ism  see  James,  p.  llff). 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


31 


The  above  representations  serve  to  show  that,  for  Jesus’ 
pathographers,  the  question  of  his  psychic  health  was  decided 
by  their  world-views  even  before  they  had  entered  upon  their 
work.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Christian  world-view,  particu¬ 
larly  the  Christian  estimate  of  the  person  of  Christ,  has  kept 
Christian  believers  from  taking  their  work  at  all  seriously. 

2)  Scientific 

The  conflict  between  religion  and  science  is  as  old  as  the 
latter.  The  history  of  modern  science  has  determined  to  a 
marked  degree  the  history  of  religious  thought;  the  former 
has  relentlessly  forced  compromises  and  concessions  from  the 
latter.  Astronomy  has  compelled  Christian  believers  to  sur¬ 
render  their  geocentric  ideas  of  the  earth  on  which  they  live. 
Geology  finds  the  earth  infinitely  older  than  a  calculation  of 
Biblical  genealogies  back  to  the  first  man  and  creation  would 
show.  Even  theistic  philosophy  finds  that  creation  was  not 
completed  on  the  sixth  day  and  that  God  rested  on  the  seventh, 
but  that  creation  is  a  process  that  is  still  going  on  and  that 
God  never  rests.  The  work  of  Darwin  and  its  subsequent  more 
scientific  revisions  have  not  been  able  to  find  man  originally  in 
a  garden  of  Eden,  or  any  other  paradise  ;  at  best  he  has  emerged 
from  a  state  of  savagery  and  barbarism  by  a  hard  climb  to 
civilization  and  culture.  Psychology  has  a  very  different  story 
to  tell  of  the  ego  than  that  found  in  Genesis  where  Elohim 
breathed  a  soul  into  Adam  and  he  lived.  The  unlocking  of  the 
scriptures  of  the  Orient  and  the  comparative  study  of  religions 
have  not  only  compromised  and  reduced  the  originality  of  many 
Biblical  narratives,  but  of  many  of  the  Biblical  teachings.  His¬ 
torical  criticism  would  make  very  radical  rearrangements  if 
it  were  to  catalogue  chronologically  the  canonical  books  as 
they  now  stand  in  both  Testaments  ;  to  Biblical  personages  that 
have  long  enjoyed  highest  repute  it  assigns  a  minor  role,  and 
some  of  the  long  neglected  and  almost  forgotten  minor  prophets 
are  raised  to  the  seats  of  honor. 

Thus  one  might  go  on  through  all  the  experimental  and 
theoretical  sciences  in  their  modern  forms  and  conclusions. 
Practically  every  one  of  these  sciences  that  have  appeared 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


32 

since  the  Renaissance  has  made,  either  directly  or  indirectly, 
in  one  form  or  in  another,  its  reflections,  often  direct  attacks, 
upon  the  Biblical  narratives,  teachings,  or  personages.  Begin¬ 
ning  with  Sender  and  extending  down  to  this  very  hour  Chris¬ 
tian  theologians  have  been  busy  trying  to  bridge  over  the  gap 
that  has  been  repeatedly  reopened  or  widened  between  Biblical 
religion  and  science.  During  this  struggle  for  survival  the 
Christian  religion  has  proved  its  Lebensfaehigkeit  by  its  ac¬ 
knowledgment,  adjustment,  and  assimilation  of  newly  discov¬ 
ered  truth.  This  has  often  been  such  a  slow  and  delayed  pro¬ 
cess  that  Christianity  has  not  always  claimed  the  modern  mind. 

It  is  only  natural  that  some  of  the  sciences  should  raise 
questions  concerning  the  central  figure  of  the  Bible  and  the 
Christian  religion.  Beginning  with  Reimarus  and  continuing  on 
down  through  the  life-of- Jesus  research  the  person,  work,  and 
teaching  of  Jesus  have  been  persistently  pressed  to  a  problem¬ 
atic  point  from  many  and  sundry  angles.  Natural  science  has 
asked:  Did  Jesus  really  rise  from  the  dead?  Was  Jesus  born 
of  a  virgin?  Did  he  actually  perform  miracles?  Historical 
and  textual  criticism  has  asked :  What  of  the  sources  of  our 
knowledge  concerning  Jesus,  are  we  to  accept  the  Synoptic  or 
the  Johannine  representations?  What  of  the  literary  relation 
of  the  first  three  Gospels,  in  how  far  are  they  historically  re¬ 
liable,  how  much  of  their  reports  is  the  product  of  myth  and 
legend?  How  much  is  to  be  assigned  to  the  reflections,  color¬ 
ings,  reworkings  and  revisions  of  earliest  Christian  piety  and 
thought?  Linguistic  studies  have  pried  into  the  meanings  of 
Jesus’  self-designations  in  the  third  person.  Psychology  has 
tried  to  force  its  way  into  the  mystery  of  his  self-conscious- 
ness,  and  has  asked:  Who  was  Jesus?  What  did  he  think  of 
himself?  Biographers  of  Jesus  have  asked:  How  long  was 
Jesus’  public  career?  What  was  its  course,  compass  and 
chronology?  What  was  Jesus’  plan  and  purpose?  Others 
have  investigated  and  sought  to  interpret  the  teachings  of 
Jesus,  and  have  asked:  To  what  extent  is  his  teaching  original, 
or  borrowed?  Is  Jesus  the  first  and  main  master  of  the  par¬ 
able?  How  are  we  to  estimate  and  evaluate  his  teaching  in  the 
light  of  modern  morals  and  ethics?  In  how  far  is  his  moral 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


33 


and  ethical  teaching  defendable  and  retainable  from  the  mod¬ 
ern  point  of  view?  Does  Jesus  have  anything  pertinent  or 
practical  to  say  on  modern  social  questions?  Or  are  his  teach¬ 
ings  so  historically  conditioned  by  the  thought  of  his  day  and 
people  and  the  stage  of  culture  and  civilization  in  which  he  lived 
that  he  has  nothing  to  say  to  the  individual  or  group  life  of 
today?  Others  have  asked:  Where  did  Jesus5  own  thought 
center,  on  eschatology  and  the  imminent  cosmic  catastrophe 
and  the  advent  of  a  new  supernatural  order  of  things,  or  did 
he  foresee  a  long  future  and  history  for  his  following  and 
church?  Historians  have  asked:  What  is  Jesus5  relation  to 
the  beginnings  and  rise  of  Christianity?  Is  the  founding  of 
Christianity  really  not  the  work  of  Paul  rather  than  that  of 
Jesus?  In  how  far  has  historical  Christianity  preserved  in  its 
purity  the  religion  and  thought  of  Jesus?  Has  it  not  seriously 
swerved  from  the  course  upon  which  Jesus  started  his  first  dis¬ 
ciples  as  it  has  struck  out  into  the  currents  of  civilization  and 
culture?  Does  not  traditional  Christianity  bear  the  marks  of 
Pauline  theology  and  Hellenistic  philosophy  rather  than  the 
simple  yet  profound  thought  of  Jesus5  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
and  his  incomparable  parables?  Students  of  the  religions  of 
the  Near  East,  and  particularly  of  the  mystery  religions  and 
secret  devotional  cults  of  the  Roman  empire,  have  asked :  Did 
Jesus  ever  live  or  exist  as  an  actual  person  of  history?  Is  it 
necessary  to  presuppose  and  postulate  a  personal  founder  for 
Christianity,  or  any  religion?  Did  not  Christianity  rise  rather 
from  a  pre-Christian  Jesus  cult?  Or  did  it  not  spring  up  by 
spontaneous  combustion  as  the  result  of  the  friction  of  hidden 
social  and  religious  forces  fermenting  in  the  Roman  empire? 
Or  is  the  story  of  Jesus  only  a  variation  of  a  Babylonian  myth, 
or  simply  that  of  an  historicized  mythical  divinity? 

From  the  above  it  is  clear  that  the  person  of  Jesus  has 
become  increasingly  problematic  with  the  rise  and  development 
of  the  experimental  and  theoretical  sciences,  and  that  the  pro¬ 
blem  of  Jesus’  person  cannot  be  solved  by  a  mere  reading  of  the 
accounts  of  him  in  the  New  Testament.  And  it  is  just  this 
fact  that  Jesus  remains  forever  problematic  that  gives  him 


34 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


charm,  and  fascinates  and  stimulates  to  renewed  study  and 
investigation. 

In  recent  years  medical  science  has  been  pushing  energet¬ 
ically  into  the  field  of  psychic  research,  which  it  had  not  here¬ 
tofore  entirely  neglected  yet  had  left  undeveloped.  This  par¬ 
ticular  task  has  fallen  to  psychiatry,  the  youngest  branch  of 
medical  science.  Psychiatry  has  had  a  hard  fight  with  super¬ 
stition,  but  this  it  shares  in  common  with  all  the  sciences ;  they 
have  all  had  a  long  struggle  before  they  were  able  to  convince 
the  popular  mind  of  the  seriousness  of  their  intentions  and  their 
ability  to  render  service.  But  the  psychiatrist  has  proven  not 
only  that  he  can  render  service,  but  that  his  services  are  indis¬ 
pensable.  He  cures,  or  cares  for  those  unfortunates  of  society 
who  are  not  sick  in  body  but  diseased  in  mind.  He  is  sum¬ 
moned  to  prisons  to  observe  and  before  courts  to  testify  to  the 
mental  health  of  those  who  have  broken  society’s  laws  or  com¬ 
mitted  crime.  In  the  recent  war  he  had  his  hospital  behind  the 
front  where  he  ministered  to  those  who  had  suffered  temporary 
psychic  derangement  in  battle. 

The  psychiatrist  is  interested  chiefly  in  abnormal  psychol¬ 
ogy,  or  psychopathology.  He  proceeds  to  study  abnormal  and 
morbid  psychic  phenomena  independent  of  the  field  and  the 
connections  in  which  they  appear.  This  sort  of  scientific  pro¬ 
cedure  necessarily  brings  him  into  the  realm  of  religious  ex¬ 
periences  where  unusual  psychic  phenomena  seem  to  be  espe¬ 
cially  frequent  and  abundant.  Here  he  cannot  proceed  differ¬ 
ently  than  in  the  other  realms  of  experience,  nor  employ  special 
methods  because  he  is  treading  on  hallowed  territory.  As  Dr. 
Dorner  writes,  There  is  no  special  psychology  of  religion ; 
there  are  only  those  laws  which  are  universally  valid  in  the  field 
of  psychology  and  which  condition  the  religious  life  in  so  far 
as  it  is  a  psychological  process  (S.  188).  The  growing  close¬ 
ness  of  the  relation  between  theology  and  medicine  in  certain 
circles  of  investigators  is  clear  from  the  sub-title  of  the  period¬ 
ical  from  which  this  quotation  is  made,  Die  Zeitschrift  fuer  Re- 
ligionspsychologie. — Grenzfragen  der  Theologie  und  Medizin. 
Krafft-Ebing  writes :  In  its  relation  to  theology ,  psychiatry 
is  interesting  since  it  shows  the  psychopathic  origin  of  numer- 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


35 


ous  religious  errors  and  sects;  and  in  history  it  shows  how 
many  of  the  mysterious  acts  of  historic  personages  find  their 
true  explanation  in  psychopathic  conditions  (p.  24). 

The  raising  of  the  problem  of  Jesus5  psychic  health  can¬ 
not  be  laid  at  the  door  of  the  psychiatrist,  but  it  is  in  connec¬ 
tion  with  this  new  science  that  the  problem  has  appeared. 
Psychopathology  conducted  under  scientific  observation  has 
suggested  comparative  psychopathology  in  cases  where  obser¬ 
vation  is  no  longer  possible.  Rasmussen’s  Jesus  is  evidence 
enough  of  this.  He  designates  his  book  as  a  study  in  com¬ 
parative  psychopathology,  applying  to  Jesus  the  tests  of  psy¬ 
chic  health.  His  general  principle  of  investigation  he  states 
thus :  If  we  find  no  parallels  to  their  experiences  (the  religious 
pioneers  and  leaders)  in  the  healthy  world ,  and  we  do  find  very 
similar  appearances  among  the  diseased ,  then  no  serious  inves¬ 
tigator  can  escape  the  surmise  that  there  exists  between  these 
quite  homogeneous  phenomena  some  real  connection  (S.  55). 

The  latest  appearance  in  the  field  of  comparative  psycho¬ 
pathology  is  pathography.  The  pathographer  pursues  a  pure¬ 
ly  pathological  programme  in  that  he  peruses  the  biographies, 
autobiographies  and  confessions  of  the  great  personages  of 
history  in  quest  of  those  psychic  phenomena  which  are  more 
usual  in  cases  of  mental  disease  than  health.  Ivneib  writes :  It 
has  become  almost  a  mania  to  test  great  men  as  to  their  psychic 
health.  Instead  of  biographies  “ pathographies”  are  the  order 
of  the  day  (S.  21)  (1).  The  tendency  is  not  only  to  test 
the  genius  mind  by  the  standards  of  psychic  health,  but 
to  explain  genius  itself  by  the  assumption  of  mental  morbidity 
and  thereby  to  depreciate  all  that  hitherto  has  been  admired 
and  loved  as  great,  or  grand,  or  good  in  the  particular  per¬ 
sonage  under  investigation.  Besides,  the  genius  mind  has  often 
manifested  psychic  anomalies  which  have  appeared  in  earlier 
or  later  life,  and  have  varied  all  the  way  from  personal  pecu¬ 
liarities,  eccentricities,  excessive  irritability  and  nervousness  to 


(1)  Das  Bestreben  die  Traeger  ungewoehnlicher  Geistesgaben  unter  die 
psychologische  und  speziell  die  psychiatrische  Lnpe  zu  neJimen,  ist  in  neuerer 
Zeit  sehr  hervorgetreten,  Moerchen,  MKP,  S.  422. 


36 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


a  complete  psychic  degeneration  which  has  robbed  the  genius 
of  his  former  creative  powers. 

In  certain  circles  of  investigators  genius  has  been  defined 
as  degeneration.  The  psychology  of  genius  as  a  problem  in 
pathology  is  as  old  as  Aristotle  who  said,  Nullum  magnum  in- 
genium  sine  mioctura  dementiae  fuit.  In  more  recent  times  the 
judgment  passed  upon  the  genius  mind  by  those  wTho  have  at¬ 
tempted  to  write  its  health  history  has  been  still  harsher.  The 
extreme  mind  is  cousin  to  extreme  insanity  (Pascal).  Lamar¬ 
tine  speaks  of  that  mental  malady  which  one  calls  genius  (See 
de  Loosten,  S.  7).  Dr.  Moreau  writes,  Genius  is  hut  one  of  the 
many  branches  of  the  neuropathic  tree;  Dr.  Lombroso,  Genius 
is  a  symptom  of  hereditary  degeneration  of  the  epileptoid  va¬ 
riety,  and  is  allied  to  moral  insanity;  Nisbet,  Whenever  a  man's 
life  is  at  once  sufficiently  illustrious  and  recorded  with  suffici¬ 
ent  fullness  to  be  a  subject  of  profitable  study,  he  inevitably 
falls  into  the  morbid  category . And  it  is  worthy  of  re¬ 

mark  that,  as  a  rule  the  greater  the  genius,  the  greater  the  un- 
soundness  (Quoted  by  James,  p.  16f). 

The  pathographer  regards  the  pathological  element  in 
the  genius  as  the  seat  and  secret  of  his  power  to  influence  his 
own  and  subsequent  generations  and  win  for  himself  a  niche  in 
history’s  hall  of  fame.  Even  psychologists  find  psychopathic 
personalities,  under  certain  circumstances,  at  a  distinct  advan¬ 
tage  in  the  race  for  renown  and  in  the  possibility  of  influencing 
their  contemporaries.  James  writes :  Borderland  insanity, 
crankiness,  insane  temperament,  loss  of  mental  balance ,  psy¬ 
chopathic  degeneration,  has  certain  peculiarities  and  liabilities 
which,  when  combined  with  a  superior  quality  of  intellect  in  an 
individual,  make  it  more  probable  that  he  will  make  his  mark 
and  affect  his  age,  than  if  his  temperament  were  less  neurotic 
(p.  22f). 

The  three  outstanding  pathographer s  of  recent  times  are 
Moebius,  Loewenfeld  and  Lombroso.  Dr.  Moebius  made  a  study 
of  great  men  like  Rousseau,  Goethe,  Kant,  Schopenhauer,  etc. 
L.  Loewenfeld  made  a  similar  study  of  great  artists  like  Michel 
Angelo,  Raphael,  Diirer,  Millet,  Boecklin  and  Feuerbach 
( Ueber  die  geniale  Geistestaetigkeit  mit  besonderer  Berueck- 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


37 


sichtigung  der  Genies  fuer  hildende  Kiinst.  Grenzfragen  des 
N  erven — und  Seelenlebens.  XXL  Wiesbaden) .  These  works 
were  not  accessible  to  the  writer  except  in  resume. 

In  its  German  translation  Dr.  Lombroso’s  work  bears  the 
title,  Genie  und  Irrsinn.  His  book  is  a  rather  helter-skelter 
collection  of  anecdotes  and  biographical  details  from  the  lives 
of  outstanding  men  of  modern  times.  He  casts  no  direct  re¬ 
flections  on  any  Biblical  character;  in  fact,  he  scarcely  men¬ 
tions  any  of  the  great  men  of  antiquity.  He  is  far  from  iden¬ 
tifying  genius  and  insanity,  though  he  does  hold  that  the  great 
majority  of  the  geniuses  of  history  manifested  at  times  symp¬ 
toms  of  more  or  less  serious  types  of  mental  alienation.  As 
instances  of  insane  genius  he  points  out  Harrington,  Boylan, 
Codazzi,  Ampere,  Schumann,  Tasso,  Cardano,  Swift,  Newton, 
Rousseau,  Lenau,  Szeckenyi,  and  Schopenhauer. 

It  is  worth  while  to  quote  at  length  some  of  Lombroso’s 
main  conclusions  concerning  the  relationship  between  insanity 
and  genius:  Is  one  justified  without  further  ado  in  drawing 

the  conclusion . that  genius  is  always  neurosis  or  insanity f 

It  is  here  that  error  begins.  It  is  true  that  there  are  moments 
which  are  common  in  the  stormy  and  passionate  life  of  the  in¬ 
sane  person  and  the  genius ;  common  to  them  are  the  periodic 
rises  and  falls  of  the  affective  life  and  the  subsequent  exhaus¬ 
tion ,  the  originality  of  their  aesthetic  productions  and  discov¬ 
eries,  the  unconscious  and  involuntary  creation  and  employ¬ 
ment  of  peculiar  expressions,  the  frequent  distractions,  the  in¬ 
clination  toward  suicide  and  not  infrequently  toward  alcohol¬ 
ism,  and  common  to  both  a  pronounced  vanity.  There  are  gen¬ 
iuses  that  are  insane,  or  become  so;  there  are  insane  that  man¬ 
ifest  a  flash  of  genius  in  consequence  of  their  affliction.  But 
to  conclude  from  this  fact  that  all  persons  of  genius  must  be 
insane  is  an  altogether  overhasty  formulation  of  judgment,  and 
is  only  the  repetition  of  the  error  of  those  primitive  peoples 

that  worshipped  the  insane  as  divinely  inspired  beings . 

If  genius  were  always  insanity  how  is  it  to  be  explained  that 
Galileo,  Kepler,  Columbus,  Voltaire,  Napoleon,  Michel  Angelo, 
Cavour,  men  who  besides  their  genius  had  only  too  great  mis¬ 
fortune  to  bear,  never  manifested  the  least  sign  of  mental  alien- 


38 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


ation  (S.  338f).  The  interesting  differences  between  genius 
and  insanity  as  pointed  out  by  Lombroso  are  too  extensive  to 
be  quoted  here;  they  are  to  be  found  on  pages  339-341  of  his 
work. 

A.  Hausrath,  Luthers  Leben ,  2  Baende  1904,  accounts 
for  the  phenomenal  psychic  elements  in  Luther’s  personality  by 
the  assumption  of  a  type  of  neurasthenia  with  which  he  was 
afflicted. 

It  is  therefore  not  at  all  surprising  that  such  pathogra- 
phic  studies  of  the  genius  mind,  sooner  or  later,  would  come 
upon  Jesus,  whom  the  Christian  world  has  always  looked  upon 
as  the  greatest  of  all  and  greater  than  all  geniuses,  discover 
alongside  his  greatness,  grandness  and  goodness  a  prominent 
pathological  element,  and  declare  as  pathological  just  that  in 
him  which  the  Christian  believer  has  always  regarded  as  his 
exceptional  uniqueness  and  believed  to  be  the  divine  dignity  of 
his  person. 

It  is  the  works  of  the  first  three  that  suggested  to  de 
Loosten  his  pathographic  study  of  a  genius  like  Jesus  Christ 
(S.  8f). 

Against  the  insanity  of  genius  and  piety,  Naumann  writes: 
As  genius  is  not  insanity ,  so  the  highest  religious  life  is  not 
insanity  but  a  'powerful  concentration  of  inner  forces  and  act¬ 
ivities  which  has  only  the  most  superficial  resemblances  to  in¬ 
sanity  (Sp.  271).  Against  genius  as  a  degeneration  Weidel 
writes :  Perhaps  the  truth  is  to  be  reached  by  the  reversal  of 
popular  medical  opinion:  the  genius  is  the  true  man  who  fully 
exhausts  the  capabilities  of  human  nature,  while  “ normal ”  per¬ 
sons  often  remain  imbedded  in  the  merely  animal  side  of  life 
(S.  83).  To  explain  all  extraordinary,  unusual  and  creative 
genius  as  a  mark  of  mental  morbidity  means  the  conversion  of 
history  into  a  madhouse,  for  everything  really  worth  while  in 
science,  art  and  life  would  be  the  work  of  aliens.  A  man  like 
Jesus  is  not  to  be  wedged  within  the  forms  which  psychological 
observation  has  taken  from  the  average  man.  Of  necessity  he 
shatters  them  because  they  are  too  cramped  for  him  (S.  28). 

3)  Historico-critical 

During  the  first  two  decades  of  the  present  century  liberal 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


39 


German  theology  has  had  no  easy  sailing.  W.  B.  Smith  has 
told  the  liberal  theologians  that  their  Jesus  never  existed  as  an 
actual  man  of  history.  A.  Schweitzer  writes  that  the  real  Jesus 
of  history  is  all-too-historical,  and  that  the  liberal  theologians 
a,re  guilty  of  a  false  psychology;  their  modernized  Jesus  never 
existed.  F.  Loofs  holds  the  liberal  German  theology  respon¬ 
sible  for  the  rise  of  the  problem  of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus. 
Hermann  Werner  pronounces  the  Jesus  of  liberal  theology  in¬ 
sane  (ein  Geisteskr  anker) .  It  is  the  last  two  named  that  inter¬ 
est  us  here  in  the  historico-critical  factors  contributing  to  the 
rise  of  our  present  problem. 

Friedrich  Loofs’  book  Wer  War  Jesus  Christas?  ( Fuer 
Theolo gen  and  den  weiteren  Kreis  gebildeter  Christen  eroert- 
ert)  is  the  German  revision  of  his  FXaskell  Lectures  delivered 
at  Oberlin  College,  September  26  to  October  d,  1911,  which 
appeared  in  book  form  in  1913  under  the  title,  What  is  the 
Truth  about  Jesus  Christ?  The  occasion  of  this  German  re¬ 
vision,  as  Loofs  says  in  his  Vorwort  ( Es  war  Wernle’s  “ Jesus ”, 
der  mich  dazu  bestimmte ,  S.  F),  was  Wernle’s  Jesus  which 
Wernle  finished  at  Christmas  time  in  1915  and  which  was  pub¬ 
lished  about  six  months  before  Loofs  completed  his  revision  on 
July  25,  1916.  Though  Loofs  devotes  his  book  to  the  refu¬ 
tation  of  two  current  views  of  Jesus,  namely:  the  one  that  Jesus 
was  a  purely  divine  figure  who  never  existed  as  a  man  of  the 
world’s  history  as  represented  by  W.  B.  Smith,  Arthur  Drews, 
etc.,  the  other  that  Jesus  was  merely  a  man  as  held  by  the  lib¬ 
eral  German  theologians,  of  whom  he  singles  out  Wernle  as 
a  typical  representative,  it  is  to  the  second  view  that  he  devotes 
by  far  the  greater  amount  of  attention. 

Loofs’  book  is  of  special  interest  to  us  here  because  he 
holds  the  modern  liberal  theology  of  Germany  chiefly  respon¬ 
sible  for  the  rise  of  the  pointed  problem  of  Jesus’  psychic 
health.  He  begins  with  Reimarus  and  goes  down  through  the 
life-of- Jesus  research  showing  that  the  liberal  interpretation  of 
Jesus  as  merely  a  man  has  set  a  false  goal  for  itself  (S.  2), 
has  suffered  ship-wreck  as  attested  by  its  own  history  (S.  3f), 
and  shows  itself  utterly  bankrupt  of  resources  to  cope  with  the 
recent  form  which  the  question  has  taken. 


40 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Loofs  quotes  and  agrees  with  H.  Windisch  to  the  effect 
that  the  lif e-of-J esus  research  presses  toward  a  psychiatric 
problem  ( Tlieologische  Rundschau ,  XVI.  Jahrgang ,  1913,  12. 
Heft ,  S.  441;  Loofs,  S.  54).  (H.  J.  Holtzmann  writes,  Fast 

scheint  es,  als  wolle  sich  die  auf  dem  grossen  W  eltmarht  ge- 
fuehrte  christ ologische  Debatte  zuletzt  in  dieser  Richtung  zu- 
spitzen ;  MBJ,  S.  81,  Anm.  1).  According  to  Loofs,  the  rais¬ 
ing  of  the  question  of  Jesus’  mental  health  is  only  the  conse¬ 
quent  culmination  of  the  attempt  to  understand  and  interpret 
Jesus  in  a  purely  historical  fashion  as  any  other  great  man  of 
history  is  to  be  understood  and  interpreted.  The  liberal  theo¬ 
logians  of  Germany  have  been  the  chief  champions  of  this  view. 
(For  a  concise  statement  of  the  “liberal”  view  of  Jesus,  see 
Case,  The  Historicity  of  Jesus ,  Chapter  I,  pp.  1-31).  Though 
Loofs  would  not  load  the  responsibility  for  such  works  as  those 
of  Rasmussen  and  de  Loosten  on  to  the  shoulders  of  liberal 
German  theology  (S.  53f),  ye t  he  does  regard  the  general 
question,  TE#s  this  Jesus  a  psychically  normal  man ?  and  Oskar 
Holtzmann’s  book,  TEns  Jesus  an  Ecstatic ?  as  directly  the  pro¬ 
duct  of  the  attempt  to  explain  Jesus  by  the  historical  methods 
as  employed  by  the  liberal  German  theologians. 

Loofs  finds  that  the  liberals  are  making  concessions  in 
the  psychiatric  direction,  and  he  cites  Heitmueller  and  Holl- 
mann  as  concrete  instances.  Heitmueller  writes  in  his  Jesus 
(S.  89)  :  As  reliable  data  of  tradition  we  have  Jesus'  conscious¬ 
ness  of  commission  which  transcends  the  compass  of  the  pro¬ 
phetic  and  the  fact  that  Jesus  laid  claim,  at  least  in  some  sense, 
to  the  Messianic  dignity.  It  is  not  necessary  to  point  out  that 
both  facts  constitute  difficult  psychological  puzzles.  And 
when,  as  has  recently  been  the  case,  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus 
is  called  in  question  and  he  is  presented  as  pathological,  the 
attempt  has  here  at  least  a  possible  point  of  departure.  But 
it  has  not  succeeded  and  it  never  will.  The  creator  of  the  par¬ 
ables,  the  framer  of  the  sayings  was  as  healthy  as  any  man. 
Much  can  be  cited  to  render  this  puzzle  less  difficult,  but  we 
are  not  in  a  position  to  solve  it  (Loofs,  S.  54f,  Anm.  5).  In 
discussing  the  books  of  Rasmussen  and  de  Loosten  in  the  The- 
ologische  Rundschau,  IX.  Jahrgang,  1906,  7.  Heft,  S.  275, 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


41 


Georg  Hollmann  writes :  Thus  a  very  considerable  reduction  of 
the  materials  used  by  both  authors  will  certainly  come.  But 
even  then  there  will  still  remain  elements  about  which  one  can 

contend , — all  that  which  comprises  the  ecstasy  of  Jesus . 

But  even  if  we  were  to  find  in  Jesus  traces  of  psychic  abnor¬ 
mality ,  they  would  as  little  hinder  us  in  laying  hold  of  the  eter¬ 
nally  worth  while  elements  in  him  as  they  do  in  the  case  of  Paid 
who  was  an  epileptic.  Even  then  the  consideration  is  available 
which  de  Loosten  himself  brings  out  when  he  looks  upon  the 
psychic  abnormalities  of  the  specially  gifted  as  the  high  ran¬ 
som  which  they  must  pay  for  their  prominence.  For  the  pres¬ 
ent  we  must  await  the  results  of  further  unbiased  research 
(Loofs,  S.  55,  Anm.  1). 

Holtzmann,  Heitmueller  and  Hollmann  make  it  clear  to 
Loofs  that  the  liberal  theologians  are  threatened  with  the  re¬ 
tention  of  their  purely  historical  interpretation  of  Jesus  at  the 
expense  of  his  psychic  soundness,  and  this  shows  him  clearly 
the  pitiable  plight  of  the  research  that  reckons  with  Jesus  as 
with  any  other  individual  of  history.  If  the  liberal  life-of- 
Jesus  research  were  pressed  to  the  point  where  it  could  retain 
its  purely  human  Jesus  only  by  surrendering  his  psychic  health , 
then  everyone  who  is  convinced  that  faith  has  an  historical  right 
would  be  able  to  hold  such  a  judgment  inadmissible  and  to  see 
therein  only  an  avowal  of  the  bankruptcy  of  a  life-of- Jesus  re¬ 
search  that  reckons  with  a  purely  human  Jesus  (S.  55).  The 
purely  historical  interpretation  of  Jesus  must  concede,  either 
that  we  know  next  to  nothing  about  Jesus  due  to  the  inade¬ 
quacy  of  the  sources,  or  that  he  was  one  of  those  religious  fan¬ 
atics  who  mean  well  but  who  are  the  victims  of  irrational  and 
impossible  hopes  which  bring  them  into  a  megalomaniacal  stats 
of  consciousness. 

That  the  liberal  life-of- Jesus  research  has  pressed  toward 
the  psychiatric  problem  is  clear  from  its  earlier  stages  in  the 
preceding  chapter.  The  writers  of  the  two  greatest  lives  of 
Jesus  in  the  nineteenth  century  witness  to  this.  In  his  1864 
Leben  Jesu  Strauss  insists  that  Jesus  was  a  fanatic,  for  it  is 
only  of  a  human  being  that  we  are  everywhere  speaking  (See 
above  p.  6).  In  his  der  Alte  und  der  Neue  Glaube  he  again 


42 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


repeats,  if  Jesus  were  a  mere  man  ( ein  blosser  Mensch;  see 
above  p.  7)  and  expected  to  return  personally  to  the  earth, 
he  was  for  us  a  fanatic.  Thus  Strauss  was  insistent  on  the 
point  of  Jesus’  fanaticism,  if  he  is  to  be  interpreted  in  a  purely 
human  way.  Keim  also  saw  the  direction  the  whole  question 
was  taking  when  he  defined  certain  characteristics  which  he  dis¬ 
covered  in  the  temperament  of  Jesus:  I  myself  in  “Der  Ge- 
schicJitliclie  Christus^  (Zuerich,  1865)  assumed  a  strong  three¬ 
fold  temperamental  endowment  of  Jesus ,  sanguine ,  melancholic 
and  choleric.  To  these  three ,  each  strongly  developed,  one  will 

always  come  bach . {only  the  phlegmatic  is  lacking)  (I 

442,  Anm.  1). 

We  are  further  reminded  in  this  connection  of  the  open¬ 
ing  sentence  of  Soury’s  book:  Apres  le  dieu  et  Vhomme ,  le  ma- 
lade  (see  above  p.  20).  Kneib,  from  the  Catholic  viewpoint, 
laments  the  widespread  inclination  on  the  part  of  certain 
groups  and  schools  of  theologians  to  surrender  the  divinity  and 
deity  of  Jesus  as  opening  the  way  for  the  questioning  of  Jesus’ 
psychic  health:  If  once  the  divine  in  Jesus  Christ  is  sur¬ 
rendered,  then  the  uniqueness  of  this  historical  person¬ 
ality  must  be  explained  as  purely  human  (S.  6).  Her¬ 
mann  Jordan  also  takes  this  view  of  the  issue  of  the  attempt  to 
explain  Jesus  on  a  purely  human  basis  (JMJB,  S.  54). 

The  harshest  of  all  judgments  against  the  liberal  theolog¬ 
ians  in  this  connection  is  that  passed  by  Hermann  Werner  in 
his  45-page  article  in  the  Neue  kirchliche  Zeitschrift  {XXII. 
Jahrgang,  5.  Heft,  1911,  S.  347-390),  Der  liistorische  Jesus 
der  liberalen  Theologie — ein  Geistesk ranker.  Werner  says 
point  blank  that  the  historical  Jesus  of  liberal  theology  is  in¬ 
sane.  The  end  of  a  course  is  the  best  criterion  of  its  truth  (S. 
347),  and  the  path  struck  out  by  the  liberal  theologians  has 
brought  them  face  to  face  with  the  question  of  Jesus’  psychic 
health;  it  thus  comes  to  pronounce  the  fatal  verdict  upon  it¬ 
self.  The  liberal  attempt  to  strip  Jesus  of  all  the  elements  that 
extend  beyond  the  confines  of  a  purely  human  consciousness  has 
been  a  delusion.  Fresh  disappointments  are  at  hand,  for  the 
morbid  Jesus  of  liberal  theology  has  nothing  left  that  recom¬ 
mends  him  either  to  the  present  or  the  future;  he  is  religiously 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


■43 

inadequate.  The  course  of  the  liberal  life-of- Jesus  research 
is  fatal;  it  brings  us  to  a  Christianity  about  to  collapse.  As 
typical  liberals  Werner  mentions  Harnack,  Hausrath,  Weinel, 
Rudolf  Otto  and  A.  Schweitzer.  The  picture  of  Jesus  delin¬ 
eated  by  these  men,  according  to  Werner,  proves  Jesus  a  par¬ 
anoiac  because  of  his  exalted  self-consciousness  and  deliriant 
delusions  of  grandeur ;  they  went  out  to  discover  the  historical 
Jesus  and  came  back  with  a  paranoiac.  The  historical  Jesus 
of  liberal  theology  is  and  remains  a  morbid  man  with  a  morbid 
mind  (S.  383). 

Historically  the  problem  of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus 
is  perhaps  directly  connected  with  the  liberal  attempt  to  in¬ 
terpret  Jesus  in  a  purely  historical  way.  But  the  liberal  the¬ 
ologians  are  not  as  bankrupt  of  resources  and  as  helpless  as 
Loofs  and  Werner  would  have  us  believe  in  the  meeting  of  the 
present  issue. 

4)  Popular  Psychological  Presentations 

The  popular  psychological  presentations  of  Jesus  by  lib¬ 
eral  theologians  have  not  only  been  very  strong  in  their  psy¬ 
chological  emphasis,  but  have  pointed  out  those  unusual  exper¬ 
iences  of  Jesus  and  the  exceptional  psychic  elements  of  his 
character  in  a  way  that  makes  them  border  closely  on  the 
abnormal,  if  not  the  pathological. 

In  his  Jesus  Bousset  asks,  Did  he  not  live  a  good  share  of 
his  life  in  those  spheres  beyond  the  confines  of  clear  conscious¬ 
ness?  (S.  11.) 

Weinel  writes  in  his  Jesus  im  19.  Jahrhundert :  Whether 
Jesus  knew  those  devotional  moments  of  ecstasy,  as  did  Buddha 
and  Paul,  can  be  stated  with  less  certainty.  Narratives  such 
as  those  of  the  baptism  and  the  temptation,  in  spite  of  all  the 
objections  that  are  urged  against  them,  afford  us  a  glimpse  in¬ 
to  such  special  hours  in  which  he  “heard”  the  voice  of  God  and 

wrestled  with  “Satan” . What  for  us  duller  souls  remains 

only  inner  experience  transformed  itself  in  the  great  soul  of 
the  prophet  into  such  sensuous  hearing  and  seeing  (S.  92). 

Rudolf  Otto  in  his  Leben  und  Wirken  Jesu  says  of  the  dove 
and  the  voice  at  the  baptism,  All  this  is  simply  an  objectiti- 


44 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


cation  of  an  unspeakable  inner  experience  in  which  all  of  those 
indicated  conceptions  played  their  part  even  to  the  extent  of 
“ hallucinations ”  (S.  31f).  It  was  against  these  very  men 
that  Werner  proceeded  in  his  above  mentioned  article;  see  above 
p.  42.  '<  ;  j  <-Jl  Mj 

Still  more  pronounced  in  its  psychological  emphasis  in  the 
direction  of  psychic  abnormality  is  Karl  Weidel’s  character 
study,  Jesu  Persoenlichkeit.  (Weidel,  head-teacher  in  Magde¬ 
burg,  is  a  student  of  Wrede’s ;  see  A.  Schweitzer’s  enthusiastic 
appreciation  of  Weidel’s  book  in  his  GdLJF,  S.  580ff).  Weid¬ 
el  finds  in  the  Jesus  of  the  Gospels  what  Nietzsche  sought  in 
vain,  the  man  of  will  ( den  Willensmensch) ;  in  a  very  unusual 
strength  of  moral  will  directed  upon  itself  lies  the  secret  of  this 
personality  (S.  26).  Jesus’  influence  on  subsequent  history  is 
not  to  be  found  in  any  contribution  of  new  knowledge  on  his 
part,  but  in  his  personality,  more  particularly  in  his  moral  will. 
(A.  Schweitzer  also  finds  Jesus  an  authority  only  in  matters 
of  the  will;  see  his  GdLJF,  concluding  chapter). 

The  character  of  all  great  men  is  full  of  contradictions, 
for  they  carry  within  their  breasts  all  the  contrasts  of  human 
experience.  For  Weidel,  the  chief  charm  about  Jesus  is  the 
variety  of  contrasts  in  his  character.  With  the  highest  rever¬ 
ence  for  paternal  tradition  and  law  he  was  at  the  same  time  the 
greatest  revolutionist  and  revaluer  that  history  knows.  Cap¬ 
able  of  the  most  passionate  fury  and  anger ,  an  austere  judge , 
a  fiery  fighter ,  and  again  a  man  full  of  gentleness  and  kind-i 

ness ,  meek  and  forbearing ,  and  a  friend  of  sinners . clear , 

calm,  determined  and  sure  in  his  action,  and  then  again  pas¬ 
sionately  stirred,  rashly  aggressive,  as  though  “ beside  him¬ 
self'  and  driven  by  higher  compulsion . king  and  beggar, 

hero  and  child,  prophet  and  reformer ,  fighter  and  prince  of 
peace,  ruler  and  servant,  revolutionist  and  sage,  man  of  action 
and  poet :  lie  was  all  of  these  in  one  person  (S.  23f). 

An  ordinary  man  would  have  collapsed  under  the  tension 
of  such  inner  contradictions.  But  Jesus  leaves  nowhere  the 

slightest  impression  of  a  man  inwardly  broken .  Only  a 

very  powerful  self-control  was  able  to  support,  without  harm 
to  itself,  such  a  variety  of  contrary  capacities  and  propelling 


TO  THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROBLEM 


45 


forces  and  to  assemble  them  for  compact  common  action.  A 
weaker  will  than  his  would  have  perished  because  of  the  very 

richness  of  its  gifts  and  powers . The  flaring  fire  of  his 

soul  would  have  consumed  any  other ;  but  he  was  its  master  and 
he  cast  firebrands  into  the  world  that  even  today  are  not  extin¬ 
guished  (S.  26f). 

His  claim  for  his  person  and  words  does  not  testify  of  a 
morbidly  roused ,  eccentric  or  fanatical  mind,  but  is  rather 
proof  that  all  of  these  utterances  are  the  natural  expression 
of  his  being  (S.  30).  His  life  was  one  continuous  conflict.  He 
turned  on  his  opponents  with  a  scathing  sharpness  and  passion 
that  was  almost  unjust.  By  his  very  nature  he  was  of  unques¬ 
tionably  passionate  temperament ;  readily  roused,  impetuously 
irascible ,  capable  of  burning  anger,  and  ruthless  whenever  the 

cause  of  God  was  at  stake . It  was  not  without  reason  that 

his  family  feared  that  he  was  “ beside  himself ”  and  desired  to 
bring  him  home  again  by  force.  What  a  foolhardy  attempt 
to  try  to  extinguish  the  fire  of  a  volcano  (S.  33f). 

There  is  not  the  slightest  trace  that  he  ever  advised  with 
his  disciples.  He  knows  what  he  will,  and  what  he  will  he  car¬ 
ries  out.  Here  he  knows  neither  obstacles  nor  deliberation.  He 
offers  no  good  advice;  he  does  not  discuss  various  possibilities; 
he  permits  no  objections,  no  ifs  and  buts,  no  indecision  and  un¬ 
certainty;  he  knows  only  to  command  (S.  35).  His  word  con¬ 
cerning  mountain-moving  faith  is  more  than  mere  parable;  it 
is  the  expression  of  his  volition.  Reason  played  no  role  in  his 
religion,  emotion  was  not  the  source  of  his  piety ;  he  was  too 
much  a  man  of  will  for  rational  reflection  or  mystic  meditation. 
His  religion  was  purely  moral  will.  He  did  not  allow  himself  to 
make  the  least  concession  concerning  the  unconditional  right 
of  morality  to  sole  recognition,  neither  because  of  the  so-called 
considerations  of  utility,  the  question  of  feasibility,  the  rules 
of  prudence,  nor  because  of  regard  for  social,  legal,  state  or 
other  regulations  (S.  46).  Jesus  knew  nothing  of  our  modern 
considerations  of  kin,  surroundings,  public  opinion,  profession¬ 
al  duties,  custom,  tradition  and  reputation. 

Jesus’  extraordinary  creative  endowment  laid  a  heavy  task 
upon  his  soul.  He  could  not  be  called  happy,  for  in  solitude 
he  must  battle  for  the  balance  of  his  soul. 


46 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Although  Weidel  makes  only  three  references  by  chapter 
or  verse  to  the  Fourth  Gospel,  his  character  study  of  Jesus  is 
taken  in  the  main  from  that  Gospel.  When  he  writes,  con¬ 
cerning  any  hind  of  vacillation  in  his  calling ,  of  a  gradual 
growth  and  becoming  certain  of  his  convictions ,  or  any  uncer¬ 
tainty  regarding  their  correctness  and  an  arrangement  of  mat¬ 
ters  with  the  popular  expectations . we  read  nowhere  a 

word . From  the  very  beginning  his  whole  action  is  car- 

rued  along  by  an  unswerving  certainty  and  confidence;  from 
the  first  moment  of  his  public  appearance  he  has  left  all  vacil¬ 
lation  and  doubt  behind  him  (S.  21),  when  he  says  that  Jesus 
directly  identifies  his  thoughts,  desires  and  ends  with  those 
of  God,  that  he  goes  to  Jerusalem  to  die  a  voluntary  death  and 
that  the  scene  in  Gethsemane  is  legendary  because  Jesus’  emo¬ 
tions  on  this  occasion  do  not  correspond  to  his  character,  as 
Weidel  conceives  it,  we  clearly  see  that  Weidel’s  picture  of 
Jesus  comes  chiefly  from  the  Fourth  Gospel  and  not  from  the 
Synoptics. 

Weidel,  with  the  others  who  have  written  popular  pre¬ 
sentations,  protests  strongly  against  the  psychiatric  judgment 
against  Jesus,  but  from  such  pronounced  psychological  em¬ 
phasis  as  dominates  his  character  study  of  Jesus  it  is  only  a 
step,  and  not  a  long  one  either,  only  an  approach  from  a  bit 
different  angle,  to  the  pathographic  studies  presented  in  the 
following  chapter.  If  normal  psychology  with  such  strong  in¬ 
clinations  toward  the  exceptional  and  abnormal  psychic  phe¬ 
nomena  can  profitably  study  Jesus,  why  cannot  abnormal,  even 
morbid,  psychology  study  Jesus  with  its  own  interests  and 
thoughts  in  mind? 


CHAPTER  III 

The  Problem  Proper 

Geographically  the  problem  of  Jesus’  psychic  health  has 
been  fought,  but  not  fought  out,  on  German  soil.  Rasmus¬ 
sen’s  book  comes  from  Denmark,  but  is  best  known  in  its  Ger¬ 
man  translation.  Binet-Sangle’s  work,  the  longest  but  not  the 
best  of  all,  appeared  in  France  and  (to  the  writer’s  knowledge) 
has  not  been  translated  into  any  other  language ;  A.  Schweitzer 
says  that  his  work  has  remained  unknown  in  Germany  (GdLJF, 
S.  365),  and  we  might  add  in  the  rest  of  the  world.  One  work 
comes  from  the  United  States,  the  large  volume  of  Hirsch 
which  appeared  first  in  German  (1910)  and  is  better  known 
in  Germany  than  it  is  in  English  (1912)  in  the  United  States. 
England,  to  the  writer’s  knowledge,  has  made  no  attempts  at 
the  problem.  Sanday’s  tentative  modern  ckristology  which  lo¬ 
cates  the  seat  of  Jesus’  divinity  in  the  subliminal  self  by  draw¬ 
ing  a  horizontal  instead  of  a  vertical  line  {Christ ologies :  An¬ 
cient  and  Modern,  Chapter  VII.,  pp.  161-185),  and  which  some 
regard  as  pathological  because  it  shifts  the  seat  of  the  divine 
in  Jesus  from  the  center  of  his  consciousness,  cannot  come  in¬ 
to  consideration  here,  for  Sanday  is  discussing  a  christological 
problem :  ours  is  historico-critical.  All  negative  pictures  of 
Jesus  in  the  psychiatric  sense,  other  than  the  two  above  excep¬ 
tions,  have  come  from  Germany. 

Further,  the  question  can  be  said  to  be  almost  exclusively 
German,  for  all  the  replies  have  appeared  in  the  German  lan¬ 
guage  and  by  Germans.  The  Anglo-Saxon  mind  seems  never 
to  have  taken  the  question  seriously ;  at  least  it  has  never  busied 
itself  with  it.  One  reason  for  this  perhaps  is  the  fact  that  the 
liberal  German  theology  with  its  purely  human  understanding 
and  interpretation  of  Jesus  has  never  gained  any  very  extensive 
foothold  on  Anglo-Saxon  territory.  But  this  geographical 

47 


48 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


confinement  of  the  question  to  German  soil  is  not  due  to  any 
special  apologetic  interest  on  the  part  of  the  German  theolog¬ 
ians  to  defend  the  central  figure  of  the  Christian  faith,  for 
academic  interests  have  played  a  prominent,  if  not  predominant 
part  in  the  discussion  which  has  furnished  the  conservative, 
liberal  and  eschatological  schools  an  opportunity  to  lay  very 
compromising  charges  at  each  other’s  doors.  The  liberals  have 
attacked  the  eschatologists,  the  eschatologists  have  launched 
a  counter-attack,  and  the  conservatives  have  started  an  offen¬ 
sive  along  the  whole  front  against  both. 

The  professional  distribution  is  also  very  interesting  and 
will  become  clear  as  we  take  up  the  study  of  each  of  the  six 
men  in  question.  Three  of  the  six  works  are  written  from  the 
medical  point  of  view;  Hirsch,  Binet-Sangle,  and  de  Loosten. 
Rasmussen  is  a  philologist  and  writer,  once  a  student  of  the¬ 
ology ;  Holtzmann  is  a  professor  of  theology;  Baumann  is  a 
professor  of  philosophy. 

1)  Jesus — an  Ecstatic 

Oskar  Holtzmann 

Oskar  Holtzmann’s  (Professor  of  Theology  at  the  Uni¬ 
versity  of  Giessen)  book,  War  Jesus  Ekstattker ?  Eine  Unter- 
suchung  zum  Leben  Jesu,  is  a  supplement  to  his  Leben  Jesu 
which  appeared  in  1901.  (Holtzmann  finished  his  second  book 
in  January,  1903;  it  was  published  in  the  same  year  in  Giessen 
by  C.  A.  Wagner  and  contains  143  pages).  In  his  introduc¬ 
tion  (S.  1)  Holtzmann  agrees  with  J.  Weiss  against  Well- 
hausen,  who  represents  Jesus’  soul  as  moving  along  in  a  con¬ 
stant  harmony  and  uniform  quiet  and  sees  in  Jesus  the  com¬ 
plete  culmination  of  the  process  of  the  elimination  of  the  ecsta¬ 
tic  element  from  piety  which  began  with  Jeremiah.  Holtz¬ 
mann  sees  in  Jesus’  person  heights  and  depths  of  spirit;  he  is 
often  passionately  impetuous ,  again  calmly  composed  (S.  2). 
There  is  no  necessary  contradiction  between  ecstasy  and  piety, 
for  ecstasy  is  a  constantly  recurring  form  of  vigorous  piety 
(S.  3).  Jesus  had  a  strong  inclination  toward  ecstatic  piety, 
but  no  one  would  claim  that  Jesus  was  only  an  ecstatic. 

Holtzmann  defines  £|icrxao^ai  as  ausser  sich  Isommen ; 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


49 


87. cream;  bezeichnet  einen  hoechsten  Grad  geistiger  Erregung , 
da  ueber  e  i  n  e  m  Eindruck  das  sonst  gueltige  Mass  der  Dinge 
verges  sen  ist  (S.  3,  Anm.  1). 

Holtzmann  begins  his  process  of  proof  by  showing  that 
Jesus  was  an  ecstatic  both  in  his  own  judgment  and  that  of  his 
contemporaries.  That  his  contemporaries  so  regarded  him  is 
clear  even  in  the  Fourth  Gospel:  7,20;  8,48-52;  10,20-21;  the 
last  reference  being  the  Johannine  parallel  to  Me  3,22-30. 

n vEpua  dyvd\}agxov  eysi  in  Me  3,30  is  the  usual  designa¬ 
tion  for  possession  (Me  7,25;  9,18  25;  Lc  4,33;  Acts  8,7). 
Jesus  did  not  deny  being  possessed;  his  enemies  had  distorted 
the  kind  of  possession;  it  is  by  the  spirit  (Lc  11,20  finger )  of 
God  (Mt  12,28)  that  he  casts  out  demons.  Just  here  it  is  quite 
important  to  note  that  Jesus  was  convinced  that  he  was  pos¬ 
sessed  and  driven  by  a  superhuman  spirit.  As  strange  as  this 
may  seem  to  us  we  must  hold  fast  to  the  fact  that  Jesus  con¬ 
ceived  of  this  spirit  as  a  personal  being  that  dwelt  within  him 
(S.  13).  Jesus  seems  to  have  left  the  impression  on  his  con¬ 
temporaries  that  he  acted  under  the  influence  of  an  overpower¬ 
ing  spirit  that  was  not  identical  with  his  own  ego :  The  impres¬ 
sion  of  the  activity  of  Jesus  was  of  the  sort  that  he  seemed  less 
to  be  acting  than  being  acted  upon  (S.  14).  He  acts  under 
the  pressure  of  intense  moods  and  thoughts;  even  his  speech  is 
not  the  expression  of  composed  reflection  but  is  given  him  by 
the  superhuman  spirit  (S.  14). 

That  he  was  possessed  Jesus  knew  as  well  as  did  his  enemies. 
His  family  knew  it  too,  for  they  came  to  fetch  him  by  force 
ixQaxfjaai)  ;  they  could  account  for  Jesus’  conduct  only  upon 
the  assumption  that  he  was  beside  himself  (Me  3,21)  ;  here  the 
very  word  ecstasy  (s|8crrr|)  is  used. 

Thus  we  find  in  Jesus  all  the  distinctive  marks  of  the  ecsta¬ 
tic:  he  is  active  as  the  agent  of  a  being  foreign  to  himself; 
he  acts  only  when  impelled  by  the  spirit  which  manifests  itself 
in  unexpected  or  violent  action ;  he  speaks  what  this  spirit  gives 
him  to  speak  which  becomes  clear  when  his  speech  suddenly 
springs  out  beyond  the  usual  compass  of  the  ideas  natural  to 
common  consciousness,  or  bears  a  tone  and  passion  which  does 
not  correspond  to  his  usual  manner  (S.  14,  Anm.  1). 


50 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


After  discussing  the  trustworthiness  of  the  sources  (S. 
16-34)  Holtzmann  proceeds  to  list  the  traces  of  ecstatic  char¬ 
acter  in  Jesus  (S.  35-113).  His  catalogue  is  composed  of  six 
groups  including  biographical  incidents,  Jesus’  ministry  of 
healing,  and  his  teaching. 

1)  The  baptism  of  Jesus  must  be  conceived,  as  Me  1,10- 
11  represents  it,  as  a  private  and  personal  experience  of  Jesus; 
to  think  of  it  as  public  as  Mt  3,16-17  and  Lc  3,21-22  present 
it  makes  the  later  course  of  Jesus’  career  impossible.  The 
baptism  is  not  a  later  legend  that  sprang  up  in  the  early  Chris¬ 
tian  community  in  connection  with  the  rite  of  baptism,  but  is 
a  real  historical  incident  that  marks  the  beginning  of  Jesus’ 
public  career.  Jesus  actually  presented  himself  for  baptism 
and  was  baptized  by  John;  this  fact  is  not  only  evinced  by  the 
account  itself,  but  by  the  strong  impression  which  Jesus’  re¬ 
tains  of  the  Baptist  and  the  high  estimate  that  the  Baptist  en¬ 
joys  in  Jesus’  opinion.  The  chief  point  of  interest  in  the  inci¬ 
dent  of  the  baptism  is  what  it  meant  to  Jesus  personally.  It 
is  here  that  he  gains  his  full  Messianic  consciousness  for  the 
first  time.  This  consciousness  he  attains  in  a  state  of  ecstasy, 
for  the  Messianic  claim  is  for  Jewish  thought  so  strikingly  dar~ 
ing  that  the  conviction  of  one’s  right  to  make  such  a  claim  for 
one’s  self  can  in  reality  he  gained  only  in  ecstasy  (S.  39). 
And  this  is  the  only  incident  in  the  earlier  career  of  Jesus  that 
would  furnish  sufficient  occasion  for  such  ecstasy.  Thus  Jesus’ 
public  ministry  had  an  ecstatic  beginning.  Jesus  knew  that  he 
at  that  time  came  under  the  control  of  a  being  formerly  for¬ 
eign  to  himself  and  which  now  had  taken  possession  of  him; 
this  was  the  spirit  of  God  (S.  40f).  This  ecstatic  experience 
took  on  the  form  of  a  vision  and  was  purely  subjective.  He 
thought  he  saw  the  spirit  descend  in  the  form  of  a  dove  and 
heard  a  voice  from  heaven.  This  spirit,  which  took  possession 
of  Jesus,  was  der  ruhende  Geist  and  did  not  as  in  ordinary  pos¬ 
session  stir  to  restlessness.  The  assurance  of  the  love  of  God 
may  he  won  in  a  state  of  ecstasy,  but  it  gives  a  quiet  that  is 
usually  foreign  to  the  ecstatic  nature.  Thus  in  one  state  of 
ecstatic  inspiration  Jesus  came  again  to  composure  (S.  42). 
At  the  baptism  Jesus  wins  a  highly  fantastic,  enthusiastic  and 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


51 


ecstatic  faith  which  constitutes  the  essence  of  his  being  and 
which  expresses  itself  in  both  his  words  and  deeds.  To  this 
faith  Jesus  owed  the  imperturbable  steadiness  and  virile  confi¬ 
dence  of  his  demeanor  (S.  13).  Jesus  could  bear  at  the  same 
time  the  features  of  an  ecstatic  and  of  a  quiet  determined  per¬ 
son  ;  the  ecstatic  element  in  him  appeared  only  when  he  must 
defend  his  faith  against  obstacles  and  opponents. 

2)  By  psychological  necessity  the  temptation  has  its 
place  just  after  the  baptism.  It  shows  us  why  the  ecstatic 
element  within  Jesus  did  not  impel  him  to  fantastic  enterprises. 
Here  Jesus’  moral  will  shows  itself  stronger  than  the  fanatic 
fire  that  burned  within  him.  It  is  this  very  ecstatic  element 
that  drove  him  into  temptation  (Me  1,12),  but  Jesus  forced 
this  spirit  back  within  its  proper  confines  ;  it  must  not  be  the 
sole  source  of  the  Messianic  moment  in  his  consciousness  as  it 
threatened  to  become.  The  temptation  was  an  inner  experience 
vitally  connected  with  Jesus’  self-consciousness,  and  it  marks  his 
suppression  and  control  of  the  ecstatic  element  by  his  0.  T. 
piety.  But  the  temptation  itself  is  a  product  of  ecstasy  and  it 
is  just  here  that  we  learn  to  know  Jesus  as  an  ecstatic.  The 
temptation  begins  in  a  state  of  ecstasy  and  ends  with  a  word 
of  Scripture.  The  being  carried  away  to  a  mountain ,  being 
set  on  the  pinnacle  of  the  temple ,  the  dream  of  forty  days  fast¬ 
ing  in  the  wilderness  are  ecstatic  (S.  49). 

3)  We  further  recognize  the  ecstatic  element  in  Jesus’ 
preaching  of  the  imminent  nearness  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 
This  Jesus  inherited  from  the  Baptist,  who,  in  the  tone  of  his 
preaching  and  eccentric  habits  of  life  and  dress,  was  a  still 
more  pronounced  ecstatic  than  Jesus.  This  idea  of  an  imme¬ 
diate  collapse  of  the  old  order  and  the  advent  of  a  new  one 
is  not  the  product  of  composed  reflection,  but  is  a  conception 
that  is  foreign  and  strange  to  the  commonality  of  men.  It, 
therefore,  must  be  designated  as  ecstatic.  This  ecstatic  ex¬ 
pectation  Jesus  sometimes  expresses  in  a  strongly  stimulated 
spirit  (Me  13,26f ;  14,22ff ;  Mt  12,28;  19,28 ;  Lc  11,20  ;  17,22- 
37;  22,30),  and  at  other  times  in  a  more  quiet  reflective  man¬ 
ner  (Me  4,1-9;  4,26-29:  Mt  13,18-21;  13,44f;  Lc  13,18-21; 
17,20f).  Jesus’  conception  of  the  kingdom  of  God  was  escha- 


52 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


tological  and  apocalyptic  as  is  evinced  by  his  own  words  and 
the  fervent  eschatological  hopes  of  Paul  and  the  early  Chris¬ 
tian  community ;  both  are  ecstatic.  Holtzmann  concludes  thus: 
The  belief  in  the  nearness  of  the  judgment  and  the  kingdom 
of  God ,  the  belief  that  he  was  the  Messiah ,  that  by  his  work 
he  was  preparing  the  way  for  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  the 
assurance  of  the  kingdom  of  God  to  individuals :  all  this  might 
and  must  be  regarded  as  ecstatic  (S.  71). 

4)  Jesus’  preaching  of  repentance  in  view  of  the  ap¬ 
proaching  kingdom  had  its  ground  in  an  ecstatic  faith  (S.  71). 
This  faith  was  from  the  beginning  determinative  in  Jesus’ 
whole  ministry.  His  Messianic  consciousness  gave  him  a  trium¬ 
phant  confidence  which  enabled  him  to  stand  independently  over 
against  the  world.  This  enthusiastic  confidence  expresses  it¬ 
self  in  Me  4,39f ;  9,23;  11,14;  11,22-24,  and  Jesus  seeks  to 
impart  it  to  his  disciples  in  Me  2,19 ;  8,34-9,1 ;  14,24 ;  Lc  10,17- 
20;  11,5-13;  12,22-32;  18,2-8.  The  ability  to  withstand 
storm  and  stress,  which  Jesus  would  give  his  disciples,  was  also 
ecstatic  (S.  74).  The  ecstatic  element  in  Jesus  gives  rise  to 
a  new  moral  conscience  as  is  seen  in  Me  7,6-15;  Mt  23,13-16 
23  25  27  29  (Lc  17,39-52),  and  in  Lc’s  Sermon  on  the  Plain, 
6,20-49.  Only  an  ecstatic  can  promise  and  warn  in  the  name 
of  God  without  reference  to  some  previous  revelation;  only  he 
can  declare  so  frankly  the  will  of  God  (S.  77).  Jesus’  protest 
against  the  assertion  of  individual  rights,  his  demand  for  strict 
self-discipline,  his  prohibition  of  the  oath,  and  his  attitude  to¬ 
ward  the  institutions  of  marriage  and  property  show  that  he 
was  not  a  calculating  nature  but  a  divinely  inspired  personality 
who  acted  less  in  response  to  outer  occasion  and  more  accord¬ 
ing  to  inner  impulse.  The  ecstatic  background  of  his  faith  and 
being  never  disappears  entirely  (S.  92). 

5)  Jesus’  ecstatic  character  further  manifests  itself  in 
his  miracles,  in  so  far  as  they  can  be  considered  historical.  The 
chief  group  of  cures,  the  healing  of  demoniacs,  Jesus  affects 
by  restoring  permanent  composure  to  the  disordered  minds 
of  the  victims.  This  constitutes  the  marked  peculiarity  of 
Jesus’  ecstatic  temperament  over  against  the  usual  type  of 
ecstatic,  who  communicates  his  contagion  to  others;  Jesus  re- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


53 


stores  composure  to  the  deranged  and  disturbed.  Neverthe¬ 
less,  we  ’find  that  Jesus  is  not  unaware  of  the  contagiousness 
of  the  ecstatic  within  him  as  Lc  12,51f  (Mt  10,31ff)  well  wit¬ 
nesses.  Other  cures  of  sickness  and  affliction,  the  precise  nature 
of  which  we  do  not  know,  are  to  be  explained  by  suggestion  and 
autosuggestion.  In  all  of  his  cures  it  was  Jesus’  sense  of  duty 
that  drove  him  to  give  relief  and  help  to  the  needy  and  sick ; 
it  was  his  ecstatic  faith  that  gave  him  the  power  to  actually 
effect  them  (S.  98). 

6)  Jesus’  prophecies  of  his  passion  and  death  are  not 
to  be  regarded  as  the  result  of  rational  reflection,  but  as  an  ec¬ 
static  intuition  of  the  impending  future.  It  is  not  an  idea  based 
on  the  grounds  of  reason  when  Jesus ,  after  the  Messianic  con¬ 
fession,  greets  Peter  with  the  words  :  “  Upon  this  rock  I  will  build 
my  church;  and  the  gates  of  Hades  shall  not  prevail  against  it” 
(S.  103).  Jesus’  determination  upon  his  suffering  and  death 
was  an  ecstatic  decision ;  it  is  this  ecstatic  experience  that  sends 
him  on  his  way  to  Jerusalem  to  die.  His  law  of  gaining  life 
by  losing  it,  Me  8,35,  is  a  paradox  in  which  the  means  for 
reaching  an  end  consists  in  the  renunciation  of  the  end  itself. 
To  submit  one's  self  to  such  an  unusual  order  of  things  means 
that  one  is  an  ecstatic  (S.  101).  In  his  word  to  the  sons  of 
Zebedee  (Me  10,39ff)  the  thought  of  his  death  seems  almost 
to  curb  his  ecstasy,  but  the  very  thought  of  the  Messiah  giving 
his  life  as  a  ransom  (Me  10,15)  for  many  is  not  a  conclusion 
reached  by  rational  reflection  upon  his  death  (S.  105).  His 
address  at  the  last  supper  is  a  highly  ecstatic  address;  it  tran¬ 
scends  the  whole  compass  of  human  consciousness  when  a  son 
of  man  declares  that,  because  of  his  death,  God  will  forgive  the 
sins  of  many  and  will  arm  them  against  future  sin  through  his 
grace  (S.  113). 

Thus  the  ecstatic  element  in  Jesus  gives  to  him  certain 
constant  convictions :  that  the  kingdom  is  near ;  that  he  is  the 
Messiah ;  that  he  knows  the  essence  of  the  will  of  God ;  that  he 
can  guarantee  to  certain  individuals  entrance  into  the  kingdom 
cf  God.  These  Holtzman  sums  up  as  Jesus’  Gewinn  aus  der 
Ekstase  (S.  111). 

But  Jesus  was  not  an  ecstatic  only.  Sometimes  he  ap- 


54 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


pears  as  the  bitter  enemy  of  the  very  essence  of  ecstasy.  He 
banishes  the  disturbing  demons  ;  he  does  not  permit  his  disci¬ 
ples  to  fast;  he  does  not  allow  himself  to  be  led  to  fanatical 
views  and  practices  ;  he  declines  disposition  over  the  places  of 
honor  in  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  knows  not  the  day  or  hour 
of  its  coming.  These  are  marks  of  soberest  discretion  (S.  116). 

To  the  non-ecstatic  ministry  and  teaching  of  Jesus  Holtz- 
mann  reckons  his  recognition  of  the  state  (Me  10,42;  12,13- 
17),  temple  tax  (Mt  17,24-27),  his  high  estimate  of  the  neces¬ 
sity  and  value  of  labor  (Lc  6,47-49;  13,6-9;  14,25-30),  his 
emphasis  upon  loyalty  to  personal  profession  and  the  world’s 
work,  his  maxim  of  service  ( Ale  10,42-45),  his  conception  of 
his  own  and  his  disciples’  preaching  as  labor,  his  opposition  to 
the  social  seclusion  of  the  Pharisees,  his  exalted  estimate  of 
the  single  soul  (Lc  15,4-10),  his  task  as  he  conceived  it  as  car¬ 
ing  for  souls,  and  his  own  personal  loyalty  to  his  own  calling 
and  commission.  From  this  point  of  Hew  Jesus  does  not  wear 

the  least  trace  of  the  ecstatic  character,  and  these  very  features 

y 

are  so  thoroughly  characteristic  of  Jesus’  person  and  character, 
that  in  view  of  them  one  could  easily  overlook  everything  ecsta¬ 
tic  (S.  123). 

Holtzmann  closes  his  book  in  the  conviction  that  we  have 
gained  a  clearer  and  more  vivid  picture  of  Jesus,  for  we  see 
in  him  a  constant  transition  from  ecstasy  to  composure  (Wech- 
sel  von  Ekstase  und  Ruhe).  It  is  just  in  tills  change  from  one 
contradiction  to  the  other  that  the  charm  of  Jesus’  personality 
is  to  be  found.  It  is  often  just  the  presence  of  contradictory 
and  conflicting  elements  that  makes  a  personality  attractive. 
The  contrast  between  clearness  and  ecstasy  in  Jesus  may  have 
been  that  which  from  the  beginning  bound  hearts  to  him,  and 
in  this  combination  of  two  apparently  opposing  features  is  to 
be  found  much  that  accounts  for  the  secret  of  his  first  great 
successes  (S.  139). 

Holtzmann’s  presentation  of  Jesus  as  an  ecstatic  is  not 
altogether  convincing  for  he  allows  so  much  in  Jesus  that  is 
non-ecstatic,  he  must  so  search,  shift  and  strain  materials,  he 
is  forced  to  note  so  many  exceptions  where  he  does  constitute 
a  greater  or  less  degree  of  ecstasy,  and  so  often  finds  that 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


55 


Jesus’  ecstatic  conduct  and  character  so  radically  and  pecu¬ 
liarly  varies  from  what  we  would  naturally  expect  of  an  ecsta¬ 
tic,  that  we  cannot  help  but  feel  that  after  all  Jesus  does  not 
fall  within  the  ecstatic  group.  If  Jesus  was  to  any  degree  an 
ecstatic,  it  was  merely  accidental  and  played  no  such  signifi¬ 
cant  role  either  in  the  career  or  in  the  consciousness  of  Jesus 
as  Holtzmann  represents. 

Holtzmann  further  leaves  us  in  uncertainty  in  so  far  as 
Jesus’  psychic  soundness  is  concerned.  He  does  not  tell  us 
whether  he  considers  ecstasy  in  general,  or  the  degree  to  which 
Jesus  possessed  it  in  particular,  as  psychopathic.  He  seems 
to  represent  Jesus  as  bridling  any  ecstatic  impulse  or  exper¬ 
ience  that  would  threaten  his  psychic  balance,  for  he  considers 
the  ecstatic  element  in  Jesus  as  making  a  distinct  contribution 
to  his  character  and  conduct. 

Perhaps  Holtzmann’s  Leben  Jesw  of  two  years  before  will 
help  us  out  on  this  point.  In  discussing  Jesus’  vision  at  the 
baptism  he  gives  to  the  third  paragraph  of  page  106  the  mar¬ 
ginal  title,  Nothing  Morbid ,  in  which  he  says:  But  one  wants 
to  hear  nothing  of  such  visions  because  they  are  marks  of  a 
morbidly  excited  imagination.  Against  this  view  two  facts  are 
to  be  urged',  first ,  Jesus  in  his  subsequent  public  life  proves  so 
abundantly  the  clearness  and  reliability  of  his  judgment  and 
the  strength  of  his  will  directed  toward  definite  noble  ends  that 
the  deduction  of  his  visions  from  a  psychic  malady  is  quite 
impossible ;  secondly,  a  religion  has  never  yet  been  founded  by 
a  personality  that  by  its  imagination  could  not  raise  itself  above 
th-e  ABC's  of  the  ordinary  run  of  things.  Then  in  note  2  on 
the  same  page:  It  would  be  well  in  general  to  do  away  with  the 
conception  of  visionary  experience  as  a  mark  of  morbid  excite¬ 
ment,  unless  one  will  pronounce  all  inspiration  morbid. 

Holtzmann’s  definition  of  ecstasy  as  ein  hoechster  Grad 
geistiger  Erregung,  da  ueber  einem  Eindruck  das  sonst 
gueltige  Mass  der  Dinge  verges  sen  ist,  is  so  inadequate  and 
indefinite  as  to  constitute  no  definition  at  all  from  the  psycho¬ 
logical  point  of  view.  As  O.  Schmiedel  writes  in  com¬ 
menting  upon  Holtzmann’s  book,  At  least  a  definition  of 
ecstasy  on  a  broader  basis  of  the  history  of  religions 


56 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


is  to  be  desired  (HPdLJF,  S.  73).  But  Holtzmann  neglects 
this.  However,  we  cannot  agree  with  the  cutting  and  unjust 
criticism  which  Schmiedel  offers  against  Holtzmann’s  delinea¬ 
tion  of  Jesus  as  an  ecstatic  character:  W  hat  hind  of  a 
picture  of  the  Savior  do  we  get!  Jesus  for  the 
most  part  “in  a  highest  degree  of  psychic  stimulation like  a 
volcano  which  with  thunderous  rumblings  after  brief  pauses 
discharges  stones ,  lava ,  mud  and  fire  (S.  75). 

But  when  Holtzmann  declares  the  stilling  of  the  storm 
and  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  to  be  historical  because  Jesus 
must  not  perish  in  the  storm ,  and  the  withered  jig  tree  must 
furnish  an  occasion  for  the  word  about  mountain-moving  faith, 
when  he  leaves  Mt  16,17-19  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  instead  of 
ascribing  it  to  the  early  Christian  community,  and  sees  in  Lc 
12,51-53  (Mt  10,31-36)  Jesus’  own  confession  of  the  ecstatic 
contagion  that  went  out  from  him,  we  feel  that  Holtzmann  is 
more  interested  in  making  out  a  case  of  ecstasy  for  Jesus  than 
in  exercising  careful  critical  judgment. 

2)  Jesus — an  Epileptic 

Emil  Rasmussen 

R  asmussen’s  (1)  book,  Jesus:  Eine  vergleichende  psychopa- 
tholo gische  Studie  (Leipzig  1905,  167  S.),  was  translated  from 
Danish  into  German  by  Arthur  Rothenburg  (The  book  appeared 
in  Danish  in  1901).  Rothenburg’s  enthusiastic  21-page  pro¬ 
legomena  to  Rasmussen’s  Jesus  is  almost  as  interesting  as  the 
book  itself.  Rothenburg  hails  Rasmussen  as  the  modern  cham¬ 
pion  of  the  consequent  criticism  of  Strauss  in  the  shattering  of 
the  traditional  picture  of  Jesus.  By  his  emphasis  on  the  psychi¬ 
atric  moment  the  Danish  scholar  has  swept  away  all  the  artifices, 
affectations,  and  pitiable  make-shifts  of  the  theologians  and 
has  enriched  the  life-of- Jesus  research.  For  the  first  time 
Jesus’  emotions  are  subjected  to  energetic  investigation  with 


(1)  Danish  philologist,  author,  and  one  time  student  of  theology,  of 
Copenhagen;  other  works  of  Rasmussen  are  Ein  Christus  aus  unseren 
Tagen,  David  Lazzaretti,  Deutseh  1906  Leipzig,  233S;  Der  Zweite  Heiland! 
Ein  Passions  spiel  in  vier  Aufzuegen,  Danish  1906,  German  1911. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


57 


the  result  that  Jesus  belongs  to  the  mentally  morbid  (S. 
XXII).  Jesus  falls  into  the  category  of  the  prophets  who 
are  all  aberrations  from  the  normal  type  of  the  race. 

Jesus  was  a  great  reformer.  His  ethics  mark  a  distinct 
advance  beyond  that  of  his  contemporary  Jewish  countrymen. 
But  his  hatred  for  the  family  as  an  institution  and  his  recom¬ 
mendation  to  live  by  alms  and  faith  have  not  been  accepted  by 
the  modern  world.  If  by  a  genius  we  mean  a  man  who  is  orig¬ 
inal  and  productive,  we  cannot  call  Jesus  a  genius.  Jesus  was 
a  man  worthy  of  our  deep  pity  whose  tragic,  yet  splendid,  fate 
deserves  our  heartiest  sympathy.  Rothenburg’s  remarks  have 
a  distinct  von  Hartmann  tone.  Jesus’  morbid  nature  forever 
forbids  that  he  should  become  a  law  for  the  healthy  soul.  As 
a  prophet  he  is  simply  one  of  the  many;  as  a  man  he  is  by  no 
means  an  absolute  ideal.  History  must,  and  in  fact  does,  reck¬ 
on  with  the  complete  collapse  of  Christianity,  for  it  has  no 
assurance  that  to  Christianity  is  reserved  the  great  guarantee 
of  being  the  fullest,  or  even  fuller,  revelation  of  God.  Chris¬ 
tianity  is  not  the  one  and  only  religion,  but  is  simply  a  religion 
among  many  others. 

Rasmussen’s  book  falls  into  three  parts  :  1)  the  Son  of  Man 
(S.  1-49)  ;  2)  the  Men  of  God  (S.  50-134)  ;  3)  the  Prophet 
Jesus  (S.  135-107).  He  opens  his  book  with  the  statement 
that  the  old  alternative,  Jesus  was  either  the  one  whom  he  gave 
himself  out  to  be  or  he  was  the  greatest  impostor  that  ever  lived 
(Rasmussen  says  that  this  alternative  was  forced  upon  him 
during  his  days  as  a  student  of  theology),  is  false.  There  is 
a  third  possibility:  a  man  may  not  be  the  one  he  represents 
himself  to  be,  and  yet  not  be  an  impostor ;  he  may  be  beside 
himself,  insane.  It  is  therefore  our  duty  to  look  into  the  Gos¬ 
pels  and  determine  two  things  ;  what  Jesus  thought  of  himself, 
and  what  the  apostles  thought  of  him.  Rather  one  investiga¬ 
tion  too  many  than  one  too  few  (S.  3). 

In  answering  these  two  questions  Rasmussen  excludes  the 
Fourth  Gospel,  where  all  the  words  of  Jesus  have  an  absolutely 
strange  and  improbable  tone  which  in  truth  is  the  author's  own 
(S.  4).  The  Synoptics  are  to  be  used  with  caution,  for  they 
often  contradict  each  other  on  important  points  and  are  open- 


58 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


ly  propaganda  in  their  purpose.  The  evangelists  have  con¬ 
cealed  and  painted  over  the  most  original  features  of  Jesus,  but 
we  have  the  means  in  our  hands  for  restoring  the  damaged 
parts.  The  Gospel  writers  were  too  naive  in  their  art  to  be 
successful  in  their  attempt  to  conceal  certain  things  that  might 
be  unpleasant  to  their  readers. 

1)  The  Son  of  Man 

Rasmussen  devotes  the  first  part  of  his  book  to  the  posi¬ 
tion  that  Jesus  was  not  the  Son  of  God,  that  is,  not  dime. 
The  idea  of  a  man  becoming  divine  was  possible  on  Roman  and 
Greek  soil,  but  impossible  on  Jewish  soil.  Strict  Jewish  mono¬ 
theism  excluded  this  possibility ;  even  the  expected  Messiah  was 
a  purely  human  figure.  The  term  Son  of  God  in  the  strict 
sense  of  deity  was  linguistically  foreign  to  the  old  Hebrew  and 
the  Galilean  Aramaic.  When  Jesus  spoke  of  his  relation  to 
God  as  that  of  son  to  father,  he  did  not  ascribe  to  himself  a 
relationship  that  was  unique  and  peculiar  to  himself  but  a  re¬ 
lationship  shared  by  the  apostles  and  others  (Mt  23,9 ;  Lc  20, 
36).  Nowhere  in  the  first  three  Gospels  does  Jesus  claim;  the 
prerogative  of  deity  for  himself,  but  he  clearly  expresses  a  re¬ 
lation  of  decided  dependence  and  knows  nothing  of  a  state  of 
preexistence  (Mt  23,39;  12,32;  Ale  10,18).  If  Jesus  did  not 
regal'd  himself  as  God,  then  there  is  naturally  no  reason  for 
endeavoring  to  he  wiser  than  he  (S.  10).  The  narratives  of 
the  nativity,  the  miracles,  the  resurrection  and  the  ascension 
constitute  no  proof  of  Jesus’  divinity.  Jesus  regarded  him¬ 
self  as  simply  a  man  well-pleasing  in  God’s  sight  and  over  whom 
the  spirit  of  God  had  come  as  in  the  past  upon  kings  and  pro¬ 
phets. 

Jesus  not  only  regarded  himself  as  a  prophet  and  a  man, 
but  the  early  Christian  community  saw  in  him  only  a  man  and 
a  prophet  (Acts  10,38).  Paul  shares  this  same  view,  other¬ 
wise  his  proof  of  the  resurrection  would  lose  all  point.  Paul’s 
conception  of  Jesus’  relation  to  God  as  a  son  in  the  sense  that 
all  men  are  sons  of  God  is  identical  with  Jesus’  own  conception 
of  himself ;  Paul  and  Jesus  are  sons  of  God  in  the  same  sense. 

Jesus  spoke  of  himself  as  the  Son  of  man,  but  the  disci- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


59 


pies  drowned  out  the  voice  of  their  master  with  the  cry,  Mes¬ 
siah,  Messiah!  Who  was  right ,  the  disciples  or  the  Master ? 
I  think,  the  master  (S.  26).  Jesus  never  gave  himself  out  to 
be  the  Messiah,  and  the  claim  of  the  evangelists  to  the  effect 
that  he  did  is  a  blow  in  the  face  of  the  Master  and  their  own 
reports  (S.  39).  The  idea  of  Jesus  being  the  Messiah  is  the 
conception  of  Jesus’  environment  which  triumphed  over  and 
suppressed  Jesus’  own  conception  of  himself  as  the  Son  of  man 
in  the  sense  of  Dan.  7,13 ;  but  he  is  here  undertaking  a  role 
which  no  single  soul,  human  or  divine,  could  fulfil,  for  the  close 
of  the  chapter  in  Daniel  represents  the  Son  of  man  not  as  a 
single  individual,  but  as  the  chosen  people  (S.  49). 

2)  The  Men  of  God 

It  is  in  this  second  part  of  the  book  that  Rasmussen 
develops  his  position  by  a  study  in  comparative  psychopatho¬ 
logy  as  the  title  of  his  work  promises.  Jesus  was  a  prophet 
as  the  multitudes  proclaimed  him  in  Mt  21,11  ;  this  is  all  he 
aspired  to  be  and,  in  order  to  understand  him,  we  must  try  to 
understand  these  Men  of  God  as  they  have  appeared  in  history. 

The  fundamental  characteristics  of  the  great  religious 
pioneers  are  as  follows:  They  possess  a  singular  power  which 
springs  from  their  contagious  and  unshakable  faith  that  de¬ 
fies  every  hindrance  to  a  degree  that  corresponds  closely  to 
the  fixed  idea  of  the  paranoiac.  With  set  rudder  they  steer 
ruthlessly  toward  their  goal.  Yet  they  have  moments  in  which 
they  would  seem  to  falter  (Jeremiah;  Jesus  in  Gethsemane), 
but  their  faith  bolsters  them  up  to  every  test.  Their  minds 
are  occupied  with  but  few  thoughts  and  their  intellectual  and 
spiritual  horizon  usually  narrows  down  more  and  more  as  time 
passes  and  passion  grows.  They  have  their  times  of  visitation 
when  their  faith  is  reinforced  by  voices  and  visions.  These  are 
moments  of  highest  exaltation  when  the  very  heavens  open  be¬ 
fore  their  eyes.  These  unusual  experiences,  which  the  dervish 
produces  by  dancing  and  some  of  the  old  prophets  by  striking 
upon  stringed  instruments,  come  naturally  of  themselves  and 
without  artificial  assistance  to  the  born  prophet  (S.  51ff). 

But  these  moments  of  exaltation  are  purchased  at  the 


60 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


price  of  hours  of  high-tensioned  fear ;  this  is  the  chief  char¬ 
acteristic  of  the  Men  of  God.  This  fear  is,  for  the  most  part, 
unmotived  and  groundless  and  approaches  borderland  insanity. 
It  can  express  itself  in  morbid  melancholy,  or  in  the  idea  of 
being  pursued  and  pressed  by  foes  (Jeremiah  and  Kierke¬ 
gaard),  or  in  plans  for  suicide  (Mohammed).  It  often  gives 
rise  to  horrible  hallucinations  (Luther).  It  is  usually  an  in¬ 
definite  and  general  fear  which  interprets  itself  in  terms  of 
personal,  family,  or  national  guilt  and  vents  itself  in  passion¬ 
ate  prayer  or  in  prophetic  threats.  There  is  further  an  im¬ 
pulse  toward  renunciation  of  the  world  and  a  desire  for  suffer¬ 
ing  as  something  not  just  to  be  faced,  but  forced. 

The  principal  feature  of  the  religious  pioneer  is  the  fact 
that  the  content  of  his  conviction  or  faith  has  been  experienced 
by  him.  He  makes  his  life ,  his  inner  experiences  a  law ,  a  re¬ 
ligion  for  others  (S.  53).  Religious  pioneers  are  not  to  be 
designated  at  once  as  mentally  morbid.  It  may  be  a  painful 
process  to  discover  diseased  defects  in  some  of  the  greatest 
personalities  of  history,  but  we  must  satisfy  ourselves  as  to  the 
precise  nature  of  these  defects  and  study  them  feature  by  fea¬ 
ture. 

The  two  psychic  maladies  to  wdiich  great  religious  leaders 
are  specially  liable  are  hysteria  and  epilepsy ;  the  two  may  com¬ 
bine  in  a  given  case,  which  is  to  be  diagnosed  as  hysterico- 
epilepsy,  for  they  are  often  due  to  the  same  causes  and  mani¬ 
fest  themselves  in  very  similar  symptoms.  Rasmussen  is  in¬ 
terested  only  in  epilepsy. 

The  sure  stigma  of  epilepsy  is  the  well-known  and  classic 
epileptic  attack,  (see  page  25Iff)  (1).  The  victim  has  the 
inclination  to  conceal  the  attacks.  The  attack  is  usually 
preceded,  or  even  sometimes  displaced,  by  a  fit  of  unmotived 
and  insane  fear.  This  fear  is  usually  accompanied  by  visual 


(1)  The  writer  did  not  feel  justified  in  omitting  a  review  of  Rasmus¬ 
sen’s  delineation  of  religious  epilepsy,  even  though  epilepsy  from  the  more 
general  psychiatric  viewpoint  is  reviewed  in  the  last  chapter.  A  presen¬ 
tation  of  Rasmussen’s  description  of  the  religious  epileptic  is  specially  to 
the  point  because  he  singles  out  those  particular  features  which  he  intends 
to  demonstrate  as  present  in  the  case  of  Jesus. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


61 


and  auditory  hallucinations  which  drive  the  subject  to  flight, 
or  prayer,  for  relief.  As  suddenly  as  the  attack  comes  it  can 
go  again  leaving  the  subject  clearly  conscious  and  fearless. 
In  more  serious  cases  the  victim  falls  into  spasms  of  madness 
and  even  commits  acts  of  violence  without  afterwards  recalling 
what  he  has  done  during  the  attack;  this  serious  form  of  attack 
is  known  as  grand  rnal. 

This  disease  can  express  itself  in  fits  of  convulsive  merri¬ 
ment  which  works  contagiously  upon  its  surroundings.  In 
cases  of  absence  the  subject  loses  consciousness  for  a  moment, 
halts  in  the  midst  of  a  conversation,  stares  expressionlessly  in 
front  of  him,  becomes  himself  again  and  seeks  to  conceal  what 
has  happened  by  taking  up  the  conversation  again  just  where 
it  was  broken  off.  If  this  condition  is  more  persevering  and 
serious,  the  patient  lies  or  kneels  down  and  is  insensible  to  all 
impressions  from  the  outside  world;  this  is  epileptic  stupor. 
There  are  further  instances  in  which  the  patient  is  for  even 
days  in  a  twilight  state  of  consciousness ;  during  this  period 
sub-consciousness  controls  either  the  minor  or  major  actions, 
yet  all  the  time  the  subject  may  carry  on  the  regular  routine 
duties  of  his  daily  life. 

The  religious  epileptic  suffers  deliriums  which  are  relig¬ 
ious  both  in  character  and  content.  During  these  states  of 
delirium  the  subject  can  be  in  terrible  torture  or  believe  him¬ 
self  indescribably  blessed ;  or  he  can  suddenly  be  reversed  from 
one  to  the  other  and  back  again.  Often  these  deliriums  are 
attended  by  such  a  degree  of  clear  consciousness  that  the  ordin¬ 
ary  person  detects  nothing  wrong  and  thinks  he  is  witnessing 
a  marked  instance  of  divine  inspiration.  Between  times  the 
patient  can  be  as  clearly  conscious  as  any  healthy  person  and 
he  has  no  difficulty  in  convincing  his  surroundings  of  his  sound¬ 
ness  and  health.  It  is  a  further  peculiarity  of  this  affliction 
that  it  affects  the  emotional  life  for  a  considerable  period  be¬ 
fore  the  intellectual  faculties  are  attacked.  During  these  in¬ 
tervals  of  clear  consciousness  the  subject,  nevertheless,  develops 
a  series  of  pronounced  peculiarities,  such  as  ungrounded  fear, 
melancholy  and  sudden  swings  of  mood  and  temper ;  these 
can  also  swing  about  into  their  very  opposites.  The  epileptic 


62 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


character  is  full  of  contradictions.  The  sense  of  his  own  guilt, 
usually  imagined,  or  that  of  others  presses  him  to  an  excessive 
piety.  He  possesses  a  sense  of  the  closeness  of  the  divine  to 
himself  in  particular  and  he  carries  the  commission  to  suffer 
for  others,  or  to  reform  the  world.  He  is  impressed  with  his 
own  greatness  and  suffers  under  the  delirium  of  megalomania. 
He  is  an  egoist,  an  egoarch.  There  often  appears  the  idea  that 
he  is  pressed  or  compelled  to  do  this  or  that,  and  this  idea, 
whatever  it  may  be,  controls  the  whole  of  his  subsequent  life. 
He  imagines  that  he  has  behind  him  a  glorious  line  of  ances¬ 
tors.  His  case  becomes  most  serious  when  all  of  these  ideas 
begin  to  systematize  themselves.  He  becomes  restless,  incon¬ 
stant  and  vagabond.  He  is  often  physically  and  intellectually 
capable  of  almost  superhuman  accomplishments.  His  sex  life 
is  often  abnormal,  either  to  the  extreme  of  excess  or  entire  con¬ 
tinence.  He  often  suffers  severe  headaches,  dizziness,  exhaus¬ 
tion  and  violent  attacks  of  perspiration. 

As  the  disease  progresses  the  victim  continues  to  degen¬ 
erate.  His  thought  and  speech  become  less  coherent,  and  he 
is  constantly  returning  to  the  one  theme  or  set  of  fixed  ideas. 
He  loses  the  ability  to  take  up,  rework  and  assimilate  new  ideas. 
Trivial  incidents  he  comes  to  regard  as  events  of  world-wide 
importance ;  his  wrorld  becomes  exclusively  egocentric.  He 
loses  his  ethical  and  aesthetic  sense  and  judgment.  Pie  is  irrit¬ 
able  and  falls  into  fits  of  frenzy  without  proper  provocation; 
he  is  distrustful  and  regards  the  whole  world  as  his  enemy.  The 
attacks  of  fear,  of  being  pursued  and  hard  pressed,  and  the 
hallucinations  become  more  frequent.  Finally  he  succumbs  to 
the  maladj"  or  dies  at  his  own  hand. 

This  short  survey  of  epilepsy  and  the  epileptic  character 
will  serve  to  show  that  the  great  religious  pioneers  and  seers 
possess  many  stigmata  in  common  with  epileptics  and  are  to 
be  regarded  as  in  a  greater  or  less  degree  epileptic  (S.  67ff). 
In  his  catalogue  of  the  religious  pioneers  whom  he  describes  as 
milder  or  more  serious  cases  of  epilepsy  Rasmussen  lists  Elijah, 
Elisha,  Amos,  Hosea,  Isaiah,  Jeremiah  (1,19;  16,1  5;  15,10; 
17,18;  18,21 ;  20,10  13;  39,26),  Ezekiel  (3-4;  33),  Buddha, 
Paul  (I.  Cor.  14,2  16  18  19  23 ;  II.  Cor.  10 ;  12 ;  Gal  4 ;  Acts  9 ; 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


63 


21,13;  27,10)  who  would  found  a  new  religion  upon  the  basis 
of  a  few  epileptic  hallucinations,  Mohammed,  Sabbataei  Lewi, 
Mohammed  Ahmed,  Oreste  de  Amicis,  David  Lazzeretti,  Anna 
Lee,  Swedenborg,  Soeren  Kierkegaard,  Johannes  Holbek ;  even 
Caesar,  Luther  and  Napoleon. 

The  names  in  this  catalogue  prove  that  epileptic  persons 
can  be  capable  of  remarkable  and  worthy  accomplishments  and 
productions.  The  diagnosis  of  their  maladies,  however,  should 
serve  as  a  guide  in  the  appreciation  or  depreciation  of  what 
they  have  said  or  done  and  in  our  acceptance  and  use  of  both. 
Here  Rasmussen  expresses  himself  in  the  figure  of  the  morbid 
mussel  and  the  pearl  cited  above,  p.  XIV. 

3)  The  Prophet  Jesus 

In  the  third  part  of  his  book  Rasmussen  comes  to  the 
theme  for  which  he  has  prepared  the  way  in  the  first  two  parts 
(S.  135-167).  His  book  can  be  regarded  as  taking  on  the 
form  of  a  syllogism  in  which  the  minor  premise  precedes  the 
major:  Jesus  was  a  prophet  (premise  and  part  I)  all  prophets 
are  to  a  greater  or  less  degree  epileptic  (premise  and  part  II)  ; 
therefore  Jesus  was  an  epileptic  (conclusion  and  part  III). 

Rasmussen  regards  Jesus  as  no  exception  to  the  psychia¬ 
tric  principle;  he  by  nature  belongs  to  the  prophetic  type  of 
temperament  which  is  to  be  observed  daily  in  our  psychiatric 
clinics.  Jeremiah,  Paul  and  Kierkegaard  are  Jesus’  psychic 
kin.  The  Gospel  materials  are  very  meagre  in  those  particular 
details  which  would  interest  us  most  from  the  psychopathic 
viewpoint.  In  fact,  the  evangelists  intentionally  concealed 
those  very  features  that  would  betray  Jesus’  demented  state. 
Yet  they  were  not  entirely  successful. 

Jesus  was  swayed  back  and  forth  with  a  pendulum-like  regu¬ 
larity  between  fear  and  violent  boldness  as  were  the  old  pro¬ 
phets  before  him.  Pie  sometimes  breaks  forth  into  uncon¬ 
trolled  frenzy  and  employs  the  coarsest  insults  against  his  op¬ 
ponents.  Lc  12,50  and  22,36  contain  Jesus’  own  confession  of 
his  fear:  so  also  Me  10,32,  as  well  as  Jesus  repeated  retreats 
to  solitude.  Me  tells  us  that  fear  of  entering  the  cities  keeps 
him  apart  in  the  desert  places.  Gethsemane  is  without  doubt 


64 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


an  attack  of  epileptic  petit  mat.  No  healthy  person  has  exper¬ 
ienced  anything  similar ,  not  even  when  in  danger  of  death  (S. 
139).  It  is  not  an  ordinary  attack  of  fear,  for  healthy  fear 
continues  until  the  danger  is  past.  The  apostles  were  fully 
cognizant  of  Jesus’  condition.  The  cleansing  of  the  temple  is 
an  attack  of  grand  mal;  in  spite  of  its  religious  character  this 
act  of  Jesus  cannot  be  described  as  that  of  a  healthy  and  kind¬ 
ly  nature.  The  whole  scene  is  simply  the  expression  of  Jesus’ 
disordered  and  afflicted  soul. 

Jesus  tells  us  nothing  of  his  inner  experiences ;  we  see  only 
his  executed  acts.  That  he  suffered  with  hallucinations  is  clear 
from  the  incident  at  the  baptism  and  Lc  10,18. 

The  portrayal  of  Jesus’  character  in  the  Gospels  is  just 
as  decisive  and  tragic.  He  rejects  home  and  country.  His 
character  is  full  of  the  most  extreme  contradictions  which  are 
tense  to  the  point  of  rupture:  noble  beauty,  quiet  dignity,  ve¬ 
hement  hate,  brutal  violence,  and  infinite  goodness  and  gentle¬ 
ness.  Jesus’  character  cannot  be  determined.  He  is  neither 
a  meek  and  melanchoty,  nor  a  brutal  choleric  temperament ;  he 
is  neither  courageous  nor  cowardly,  neither  affable  nor  un¬ 
sociable.  He  is  all  of  them  alternately:  melancholy,  courage¬ 
ous  and  affable;  choleric,  cowardly  and  unsociable.  The  malady 
is  the  restlessness  which  compels  him  to  swing  like  the  pendulum 
from  one  extreme  to  the  other  (S.  143). 

Jesus’  self-exaltation  ( Selhstgefuehl )  expresses  itself  not 
only  in  his  claim  for  superhuman  dignity  but  in  his  ridiculous 
attitude  toward  the  Pharisees  and  in  the  lack  of  agreement  be¬ 
tween  his  instructions  and  his  own  conduct.  He  is  not  the  meek 
person  that  he  recommends  others  to  be,  but  accepts  every  pos¬ 
sible  deference  from  any  sort  of  person.  He  regards  himself 
as  a  reformer  and  would  make  his  own  abnormal  conduct  and 
character  a  law  and  religion  for  all  humanity.  He  cannot  be 
bound  by  either  law  or  custom,  and  one  could  extend  to  him  the 
sincerest  sympathy  and  support  on  this  point  if  he  had  been 
consequent  instead  of  creating  new  regulations  peculiar  to  his 
own  person  and  trying  to  force  them  upon  others,  such  as  his 
command  to  hate  the  family,  his  prohibition  against  saving  and 
economy,  divorce,  assertion  of  self-rights,  and  his  recommend- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


65 


at  ion  for  continence.  No  normal  and  healthy  person  could  car¬ 
ry  out  these  precepts. 

Jesus’  idea  of  his  suffering;  atoning;  for  the  sins  of  others 
is  the  product  of  his  epileptic  megalomania.  Early  Christian¬ 
ity  looked  upon  Jesus  as  a  model  of  gentleness  and  love,  but 
the  evangelists  give  us  quite  a  different  picture.  Jesus  hated 
his  own  family,  and  his  family  in  turn  hated  him.  It  is  true 
that  he  was  kind  to  the  sick  and  the  poor,  but  that  belonged 
to  his  supposed  calling;  besides,  they  offered  no  opposition  to 
him.  But  not  one  of  the  first  three  Gospels  tells  us  that  real 
friendly  sympathy  attached  him  to  any  person.  His  disciples 
were  his  servants,  not  his  friends;  they  were  also  the  objects 
of  his  distrust.  Jesus  is  represented  as  a  friend  of  children, 
but  we  are  not  once  told  that  he  sought  them  out  because  of 
real  love  for  them;  they  rather  furnished  useful  illustrations 
for  his  teaching.  Jesus  never  knew  what  it  was  to  be  thankful; 
a  word  of  gratitude  never  crosses  his  lips.  He  accepts  every¬ 
thing  as  a  mere  matter  of  course.  The  author  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel  feels  this  coldness  in  the  Sjmoptic  picture  of  Jesus  and 
attempts  to  tone  it  up  a  bit  by  introducing  the  beloved  disciple, 
Jesus  designation  of  his  disciples  as  his  friends,  his  strange 
love  for  Lazarus,  and  his  dying  word  in  behalf  of  his  mother. 
It  is  to  be  regretted  that  we  cannot  place  confidence  in  this 
Johannine  representation. 

Jesus  was  seized  by  a  vagabond  restlessness  that  does  not 
correspond  to  the  Old  Testament  prophecy  concerning  the  Mes¬ 
siah.  Lie,  further,  placed  a  too  low  estimate  upon  the  relation 
of  the  sexes.  He  was  unmarried  and  recommended  the  same 
state  to  others.  He  looked  upon  the  sex  life  as  something  1owt 
and  declared  that  such  relations  would  not  obtain  in  the  king¬ 
dom  of  God.  Only  a  sick  person  could  entertain  such  a  view. 
Jesus’  mental  and  spiritual  horizon  narrowed  down  until  he  sawr 
nothing  but  himself,  his  mission,  and  whatever  might  contribute 
to  both.  His  parables  with  their  monotonous  theme  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  evince  the  unvaried  and  confined  compass  of 
his  ideas.  His  contemporaries  and  his  own  family  pronounced 
him  insane. 

Jesus’  teaching  sprang  from  three  sources:  1)  his  own 


66 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


peculiar  and  pathological  nature;  2)  his  set  convictions  con¬ 
cerning  the  imminent  kingdom  of  God ;  3)  his  circle  of  follow¬ 
ers.  The  first  forbids  that  his  teaching  should  become  norma¬ 
tive  for  religious  conduct.  The  second  gave  him  an  opportun¬ 
ity-  to  pronounce  his  dogmatic  precepts  and  vent  his  wrath 
against  his  opponents.  The  third  satisfied  his  selfish  ambition 
to  be  the  center  of  a  circle  of  admiring  followers.  His  follow¬ 
ers  must  catch  his  restlessness  in  order  that  his  teaching  might 
be  propagated;  it  was  therefore  necessary  to  remove  every 
point  of  attachment  by  demanding  the  full  surrender  of  home 
and  property.  Jesus  further  recommended  living  by  alms,  an 
untenable  solution  of  the  social  question.  In  both  the  form  and 
content  of  his  teaching  Jesus  was  only  an  imitator  of  the  pro¬ 
phets  and  rabbis. 

In  his  emphasis  upon  the  disciple’s  fate  as  dependent  up¬ 
on  his  relation  to  his  own  person  the  affliction  of  Jesus  again 
comes  to  light.  His  emphasis  upon  the  value  of  faith  is  simply 
\i  revival  of  Habakkuk  and  has  never  convinced  the  world  of 
men.  The  whole  of  humanity  assumes  in  fact  and  in  practice 
that  the  worth  of  a  man  does  not  depend  on  what  he  believes , 
but  on  what  he  does  (S.  156). 

Against  this  diagnosis  of  epilepsy  in  the  case  of  Jesus  one 
cannot  raise  the  objection  of  Jesus’  extraordinary  influence. 
His  influence  and  impression  upon  his  contemporaries  was  very 
meagre  and  in  no  wise  to  be  compared  with  that  of  Mohammed 
or  David  Lazzaretti ;  Jesus  had  not  more  than  a  few  score  of 
disciples  at  the  time  of  his  death,  but  theirs  numbered  millions 
and  both  were  demented.  The  objection  that  Jesus’  moral  and 
spiritual  qualities  forbid  that  he  was  a  diseased  mind  is  without 
forcefulness,  for  even  a  genius  may  be  an  epileptic.  There  can¬ 
not  be  the  least  doubt  that  Jesus  could  have  been  morbid  and 
genial  at  the  same  time  (S.  160). 

We  recognize  von  Hartmann  again  in  the  closing  para¬ 
graphs  of  Rasmussen’s  book  when  he  writes:  Not  even  the 
clericals  want  to  follow  the  ideal  (Jesus).  The  ideal  of  our  day 
is  the  human ,  sociable  and  patriotic  person ,  the  faithful  work¬ 
er,  the  good  father  of  a  family  who  in  tolerable  fortune  strives 
to  surround  himself  and  his  family  with  beauty  and  happiness 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


67 


. Jesus  is  the  polar  opposite  of  all  this . Why  then 

not  he  honest  and  say  that  Jesus  is  no  longer  the  ideal  of  our 
time?  (S.  162f ).  Life’s  ideals  are  not  given  by  God  or  naan, 
but  rise  from  within  one’s  own  breast.  It  was  the  morbid  ele¬ 
ment  in  Jesus’  message  that  won  for  him  his  triumph;  all  that 
was  best  in  him  has  been  neglected. 

In  conclusion  Rasmussen  defines  his  attitude  toward  Jesus : 
If  we  should  sum  up  our  fundamental  attitude  toward  Jesus  it 
would  he  a  genuine  sympathy  for  an  exceedingly  unfortunate 
nature  with  a  tragic  yet  splendid  fate  (S.  161).  Soeren  Kier¬ 
kegaard  was  right  again  when  he  said  to  Lewin :  You  are  for¬ 
tunate;  you  are  free  from  Jesus  (closing  sentence,  S.  166). 

The  more  one  reads  Rasmussen’s  Jesus  the  less  is  one  im¬ 
pressed  with  it.  There  is  a  tone  of  ingenuineness  that  per¬ 
vades  it  from  beginning  to  end.  It  contains  frequent  lapses 
of  taste  in  certain  course  materials  cited  (see  pages  92f,  lOOf, 
105)  which  do  not  have  the  remotest  parallel  in  the  life  of  Jesus. 
Rasmussen’s  syllogism  (see  page  63)  is  neither  convincing  nor 
sound,  for  he  draws  his  conclusion  from  a  false  premise;  that 
all  the  religious  pioneers  and  prophets  were  epileptic  is  a  whole¬ 
sale  sweeping  statement  devoid  of  historical  basis.  The  his¬ 
torian  cannot  thus  toss  all  prophets  and  champions  of  religion 
into  the  same  pathological  pot.  Of  the  total  of  167  pages  of 
his  book  Rasmussen  devotes  less  than  thirty  pages  to  the  point 
to  be  proven,  namely,  that  Jesus  was  an  epileptic.  Within 
these  thirty  pages  he  deals  in  dogmatic  generalizations ;  he 
cites  only  thirteen  references  to  the  Gospels  by  chapter  and 
verse.  Rasmussen  is  hardly  to  be  classed  among  the  patho- 
graphers  of  Jesus,  for  he  undertakes  no  systematic  sifting  of 
the  sources  as  the  three  next  writers  do.  However,  he  is  more 
careful  and  critical  in  his  use  of  the  sources  than  those  who 
diagnose  paranoia  in  the  case  of  Jesus,  for  he  excludes  the 
Fourth  Gospel  and  even  notes  the  weak  textual  basis  for  such 
a  passage  as  Lc  22,43-4 4. 

3)  Jesus — a  Paranoiac 
Dr.  de  Loosten  (Dr.  Georg  Lomer) 

Dr.  de  Loosten  is  a  pseudonym  for  Dr.  Georg  Lomer,  head- 


68 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


physician  at  the  Holstein  Provincial  Institute  for  the  Insane 
u  Neustadt.  His  pathographic  study  of  Jesus  bears  the  title, 
Jesus  Cliristus  vom  Standpunkte  des  Psychiaters.  Eine 
kritische  Studie  fuer  Fachleute  und  gebildete  Laien  (Bamberg 
1905,  10IS).  (Other  similar  studies  by  de  Loosten  are: 
Ignatius  von  Loyola.  Vom  Erotiker  zum  Heiligen.  Eine  path- 
ographische  Gescliichts  studie,  1913;  Krankes  Christentum. 
Gedanken  eines  Arztes  ueber  Religion  und  Kirchenerneuerung, 
1911;  Das  Christusbild  in  Gerhart  Hauptmanns  “ Emanuel 
Quint.”  Eine  Studie,  1911). 

In  his  preface  de  Loosten  states  that  he  has  undertaken 
his  pathographic  study  of  Jesus  in  the  effort  to  throw  new 
light  upon  certain  points  in  the  life  of  Jesus  that  are  in  need 
of  illumination,  and  that  he  was  encouraged  to  carry  it  out 
in  the  hope  that  a  physician  would  feel  free  to  recognize  and 
express  certain  things  in  the  character  of  Jesus  which  the  the¬ 
ologian,  for  very  good  reasons,  must  pass  over  in  silence.  He 
intends  to  offer  a  critique  of  the  career  of  Jesus  from  the  un¬ 
prejudiced  viewpoint  of  a  modern  specialist  in  mental  disease 
as  based  on  the  literature  that  has  come  down  to  us  concern¬ 
ing  Jesus. 

In  the  first  part  of  his  book  de  Loosten  makes  a  brief 
survey  of  the  psychology  of  genius  as  it  has  been  studied  from 
the  psychiatric  angle.  The  appearance  of  any  man  in  history 
is  as  natural  an  event  as  any  other  phenomenon  of  nature  and 
is  bound  up  in  the  same  chain  of  causation  as  any  other  nat¬ 
ural  fact.  The  influence  of  a  genius  on  his  time  is  possible 
only  when  his  ideas  already  lie  unformulated  and  unexpressed 
in  the  minds  of  his  contemporaries;  it  is  just  this  ability  to 
formulate  the  unformulated  and  express  the  unexpressed  that 
makes  him  a  genius. 

The  great  geniuses  of  history  have  been  studied  from  the 
psychopathic  point  of  view ;  then  de  Loosten  asks,  Does  such 
a  critical  investigation  dare  approach  a  genius  like  Jesus 
Christ  in  the  expectation  of  finding  sufficient  materials  for 
such  a  precarious  discussion  and  in  the  hope  of  not  being  mis¬ 
understood ?  (S.  8f).  He  believes  that  this  question  can  be 
answered  in  the  affirmative ;  however,  such  a  study  is  reserved 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


69 


for  those,  as  the  supplement  to  the  title  of  his  book  indicates, 
who  are  capable  of  distinguishing  between  the  person  and  the 
words  of  Jesus  and  of  retaining  the  pure  kernel  of  an  immor¬ 
tal  teaching.  Present-day  science  does  not  look  upon  the  ec¬ 
centricities  of  the  genius  as  the  stigmata  of  a  mental  malady, 
but,  if  such  are  present,  as  the  high  price ,  as  the  great  ransom, 
which  these  gifted  souls  must  pay  for  the  preference  which 
they  enjoy  over  against  the  tens  and  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
less  gifted  mortals.  History  teaches,  that  a  psychopa¬ 
thic  constitution ,  if  it  is  otherwise  highly  and  strongly  gifted, 
can  influence  in  a  formative  way  the  succeeding  centuries  and 
bring  millions  under  its  spell  ( Mohammed )  (S.  10). 

The  problem  at  hand  is  not  to  be  solved  by  orthodox  theo¬ 
logians  whose  authority  is  dogma  and  whose  slogan  is  believe ; 
even  the  liberal  theologians  have  avoided  the  real  alternative, 
morbid  or  healthy  (S.  16).  Medical  experts  alone  are  qualified 
to  pass  a  judgment  of  sickness  or  health.  Seeing  and  knowing 
is  better  than  believing;  and  the  removal  of  the  bandages 
(faith),  which  have  become  unnecessary,  from  eyes  that  they 
may  see  and  know  is  the  purpose  and  goal  of  all  science  (S.  17). 

In  the  second  part  of  his  book  (S.  18-91)  de  Loosten  goes 
to  the  problem  proper  of  Jesus’  psychic  health.  The  physical 
and  mental  health  of  an  historical  individual  is  to  be  deter¬ 
mined  along  four  lines  of  investigation:  1)  his  anthropological 
and  social  extraction;  2)  the  environment  in  which  he  lived  and 
grew;  3)  his  words  and  acts;  I)  the  impression  he  made  upon 
others  and  their  judgment  of  his  physical  and  mental  health. 
These  four  principles  must  also  guide  in  the  study  of  the  psy¬ 
chic  health  of  Jesus. 

1)  We  know  nothing  of  value  concerning  Jesus’  ancestry 
or  descent.  The  birth  stories  of  Mt  and  Lc  are  religious  fic¬ 
tions  ;  they  really  go  to  show  that  Jesus  was  of  illegitimate 
birth,  for  they  know  nothing  of  Jesus’  father.  The  legend  of 
the  supernatural  birth  in  Mt  1,18  and  Lc  1,35  is  an  invention 
to  cover  up  the  disgrace.  Further  support  of  the  fact  of 
Jesus’  illegitimate  birth  is  found  in  Origen’s  Contra  Celsum 
(See  Keim’s  Celsus ’  Wahres  Wort,  S.  Ilf)  and  the  Talmud 
report  where  Jesus  is  represented  as  the  son  of  a  Graeco-Rom- 


TO 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


an  soldier.  Besides  Jesus  manifested  psychically  so  many  non- 
Semitic  features  that  he  could  well  have  been  a  half-caste  of 
pure  Jewish  and  of  perhaps  Greek  or  Greek-Lesser  Asiatic 
blood  (S.  21).  We  know  more  of  Jesus’  mother  and  kin.  She 
was  related  to  Elizabeth  whose  son,  John  the  Baptist,  was  de¬ 
clared  to  be  insane  by  his  contemporaries  (Mt  11,18;  Lc  7,33). 
The  possibility  that  Jesus  suffered  by  hereditary  transmission 
through  this  relationship  of  the  mothers  cannot  be  gainsaid. 
Perhaps  Jesus’  brother  James  was  similarly  affected.  (Soury 
also  made  this  point;  see  above  p.  21). 

2)  Jesus  was  born  in  a  time  of  the  most  turbulent  nation¬ 
al  fomentation.  A  directly  paranoiac  type  of  thought  (S.  25), 
which  was  born  of  a  feverish  hope  for  political  deliverance, 
swayed  great  masses  of  the  people  in  Jesus’  land  and  day.  The 
Jews  believed  that  they  suffered  because  of  their  own  sinful¬ 
ness:  What  psychiatrist  is  not  involuntarily  reminded  by  this 
type  of  thought  of  typical  clinical  cases  of  melancholia!  A 
part  of  Israel  had  in  fact  become  morbid  (S.  25)  from  the 
nervous  shock  of  Roman  oppression.  This  popular  conscious¬ 
ness  of  guilt  found  a  crystalization  point  in  the  person  of  the 
Baptist.  That  John  was  demented  is  evinced  not  only  by  the 
judgment  of  his  contemporaries  but  by  his  eccentric  habits  of 
life  and  dress;  he  was  an  excellent  example  of  kultureller  Ver- 
wilderung  (S.  28). 

3)  Jesus  was  born  in  a  province  of  mixed  bloods  and 
dialects.  His  training  at  home  was  doubtless  that  of  every 
orthodox  Jewish  boy  of  the  time.  Of  his  youth  and  childhood 
we  possess  only  apocryphal  legends,  yet  some  of  these  may  con¬ 
tain  a  grain  of  truth  now  and  then.  Incidents  in  the  Gospels 
of  Thomas  and  the  Hebrews  picture  Jesus  as  a  not  altogether 
lovable  boy.  His  reply  to  his  mother  in  Lc  2,49  is  impious  and 
his  whole  attitude  is  to  be  described  as  unnatural  to  a  child  of 
his  age.  If  his  parents  expected  a  word  of  childish  love  or 
request  for  forgiveness,  to  which  they  were  entitled  after  three 
days  of  anxious  searching,  they  were  disappointed.  Jesus’  prev¬ 
ious  discussion  with  the  doctors  in  the  temple  shows  an  exag¬ 
gerated  self-consciousness  and  premature  intellectual  ripeness. 
De  Loosten  describes  Jesus’  characteristics  as  a  child  as  fol- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


71 


lows:  A  prematurely  keen  mind,  a  strongly  developed  self- 
consciousness ,  and  possibly  an  ethical  defect  in  matters  of  nat¬ 
ural  human  affections  (S.  32). 

Of  Jesus’  life  from  twelve  to  thirty  years  wre  know  noth¬ 
ing.  But  the  Jewish  scriptures  played  an  important  role  dur¬ 
ing  these  years.  Jesus’  exaggerated  self-consciousness  does  not 
seem  to  have  left  him ;  it  was  because  of  this  doubtless  that  the 
break  wTas  brought  about  between  Jesus  and  his  family,  for  he 
considered  himself  superior  to  them  and  entertained  a  con¬ 
descending  attitude  toward  them.  Perhaps  their  knowledge  of 
his  dishonorable  birth  augmented  their  dislike  for  him.  The 
foreign  blood  in  his  veins  doubtless  accounts  for  the  differences 
with  his  family,  and  it  is  to  be  regarded  as  an  instance  of 
hatred  due  to  race  prejudice.  Jesus  was  gifted  much  more 
richly  than  his  brethren  and  this  would  bring  about  a  natural 
estrangement  as  the  years  passed.  His  own  family  seemed  to 
show  not  the  least  understanding  for  him. 

Jesus,  captivated  by  his  own  peculiar  thoughts  that 
stormed  high  heaven ,  was  not  only  separated  from  his  family, 
but  a  great  gulf  came  to  separate  him  from  his  fellow-country¬ 
men.  His  self-consciousness,  unhindered  bv  its  own  self-con- 
tradictions,  grew  gradually  toward  an  infinite  exaggeration. 
Plis  idea  that  he  was  better  than  his  contemporaries  came  to 
constitute  an  essential  element  of  his  ego.  Step  by  step  he 
came  to  interpret  the  prophetic  promises  as  pointing  directly 
to  his  own  person.  This  was  a  purely  pathological  process 
which  the  psychiatrist  describes  as  Wahnbildung  and  without 
which  the  character  of  Jesus’  subsequent  conduct  is  inconceiv¬ 
able.  The  world  of  ordinary  thought,  as  rich  as  it  was,  satis¬ 
fied  him  no  longer.  The  turbulent  complex  of  ideas  that  surged 
in  his  brain  sought  for  an  avenue  by  which  they  could  dis¬ 
charge  their  energy  and  relieve  their  subject  by  bringing  him 
into  action.  John  the  Baptist  furnished  this  occasion. 

It  was  this  subjective  tumult  that  brought  Jesus  to  the  Bap¬ 
tist,  and  this  step  marks  the  culmination  point  of  a  long  pro¬ 
cess  of  inner  incubation  that  had  been  working  within  Jesus’ 
soul.  At  his  baptism  Jesus  experiences  a  vision  which  strongly 
influenced  his  later  decisions.  Psychologically  the  vision  was 


72 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


an  hallucination  with  apperceptive  connections  and  was  at¬ 
tended  by  an  abnormal  emotional  upheaval.  The  increased 
psychic  pressure  drove  Jesus  into  the  wilderness  where  he  could 
be  alone  for  the  necessary  inner  adjustments.  During  the  period 
of  the  temptation  Jesus  doubtless  had  other  hallucinations  or 
visions  which  centered  about  his  exalted  self-consciousness. 
Jesus’  physical  condition  was  pathologically  altered  as  the  re¬ 
sult  of  long  fasting  and  furnished  fertile  soil  for  such  hallucin¬ 
ations  as  Mt  and  Lc  record  in  their  three  temptations.  The 
temptation  period,  then,  marks  a  physiological  and  psychic 
crisis  in  which  Jesus  determines  upon  a  role  never  }^et  attempted 
in  the  world  of  his  day. 

Jesus’  first  step  in  public  was  to  win  a  respectable  fol¬ 
lowing;  in  doing  this  he  did  not  even  shun  an  occasional  capta- 
tio  benevolentiae  as  in  the  case  of  the  winning  of  Nathanael. 
His  feeling  of  superiority  again  expresses  itself  in  his  attitude 
as  a  junior  rival  of  the  Baptist,  to  whose  disciples  Mt  11,11 
and  Lc  7,28  are  an  open  challenge  to  desert  their  teacher  in 
favor  of  himself.  In  this  Jesus  was  not  altogether  successful, 
for  the  Baptist’s  reputation  was  too  well  established  for  an 
innovator  to  uproot;  Jesus’  real  success  begins  only  when  the 
Baptist  has  been  removed  from  the  scene.  The  unfortunate 
sermon  in  Nazareth  (Lc  1,18-27)  shows  that  Jesus’  idea  of  his 
own  excellence  over  against  his  countrymen  could  lead  him  to 
violate  the  simplest  dictates  of  prudence.  He  was  forced  to 
transfer  the  scene  of  his  ministry  to  Capernaum.  Jesus  laid 
important  stress  upon  his  miracles  as  is  shown  by  the  fact  that 
he  is  angered  when  he  fails  to  find  faith;  his  teaching  he  sub¬ 
ordinated  entirely  to  his  ministry  of  miracle  as  is  seen  by  his 
reply  to  the  Baptist’s  deputation  (Mt  ll,5ff ;  Lc  7,22ff). 
Jesus’  teaching  contained  nothing  essentially  new.  His  par¬ 
ables,  for  all  their  poetic  perfection,  center  selfishly  upon  his 
own  person.  Jesus  did  not  make  his  points  by  careful  logic, 
but  by  ready  reference  to  Old  Testament  prophecy.  Jesus 
never  knew  how  much  he  hurt  his  cause  by  not  allowing  his 
disciples  to  choose  between  his  person  and  his  teaching.  In 
order  that  they  might  assimilate  those  elements  in  his  person - 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


73 


ality  that  held  promise  for  the  future ,  they  had  to  take  the 
pathological  elements  in  the  bargain  (S.  47). 

Jesus  laid  greatest  stress  upon  the  pathological  element 
in  his  person  and  regarded  himself  as  nothing  short  of  divine. 
He  commanded  silence  on  the  point  of  his  identity  after  the 
confession  at  Caesarea  Philippi  because  he  had  not  yet  suffici¬ 
ent  following  to  carry  out  his  plan.  Me  8,30  was  an  act  of  the 
healthy  prudence  which  he  still  possessed  sufficiently  at  that 
time  in  order  to  avoid  too  irrational  actions  (S.  49).  Peter’s 
confession  met  with  Jesus’  full  approval  and  satisfaction,  for 
it  must  have  been  a  matter  of  no  little  worry  to  him  that  the 
first  to  confess  his  Messiahship  were  deranged  demoniacs  who 
hardly  belonged  to  the  intellectual  elite  of  the  land ;  now  one 
of  his  own  healthy-minded  disciples  makes  the  longed-for  con¬ 
fession.  This  incident  combined  with  his  increasing  following 
and  successes  brings  Jesus’  Selbst gefuehl  to  still  higher  heights. 
He  now  makes  the  conditions  of  discipleship  still  more  exorbit¬ 
ant  (the  rich  young  ruler)  and  they  constitute  an  anarchy 
against  regulated  civil  order.  Mt  8,19-22  (Lc  9,57-62)  and 
Lc  14,  26  33  show  that  Jesus  had  lost  all  natural  human  feeling. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  de  Loosten’s  comment  on  Jesus’ 
regard  for  children,  for  he  finds  this  the  most  human  and  lov¬ 
able  feature  in  Jesus’  character.  The  same  man  who  other¬ 
wise  had  lost  the  domestic  sense  almost  entirely  affectionately 
devotes  himself  to  children  (S.  53). 

Jesus  never  lost  his  natural  intellectual  ability;  he  pos¬ 
sessed  a  striking  dialectic  that  never  missed  the  mark  and  stood 
always  at  his  disposition.  This  native  gift  combined  with  his 
extraordinary  command  of  the  Jewish  scriptures  enabled  him 
to  defeat  his  opponents  on  their  own  ground.  The  manner  and 
method  with  which  he  despatches  the  Pharisees  and  Sadducees 
in  numerous  disputes  still  await  their  parallel  (S.  53). 

4)  We  now  come  to  Jesus’  impression  upon  his  contem¬ 
poraries  and  their  judgment  of  him.  In  order  for  one  individ¬ 
ual  to  influence  another  the  two  must  have  a  great  deal  in  com¬ 
mon  in  both  character  and  thought ;  few  points  of  common  con¬ 
tact  bring  about  certain  conflict.  A  genius  can  always  work 
best  among  men  of  his  own  race  and  land ;  his  ideas  must  be 


74 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


organically  born  out  of  his  own  people’s  thought  in  order  to 
make  a  real  and  lasting  impression.  A  study  from  this  point 
of  view  throws  an  interesting  light  on  Jesus.  Christianity  made 
its  progress  in  the  Occident  and  lost  the  Orient  where  was  the 
cradle  of  its  infancy.  This  fact  dates  back  as  early  as  Jesus’ 
choice  of  his  first  disciples  who  came  from  Galilee  and  of  the 
peasant  class  from  which  Jesus  himself  came.  In  Galilee  Jesus 
was  successful;  he  was  put  to  death  in  Jerusalem  where  he  was 
not  understood.  Jesus’  lowly  origin  explains  his  injustice  and 
prejudice  against  the  rich  (Lc  16,19-31).  Jesus  was  not  care¬ 
ful  enough  in  his  associations  to  appeal  to  the  better  classes 
of  people.  He  had  no  appreciation  of  the  state,  and  he  was 
not  interested  in  the  artistic  architecture  of  the  temple  which 
one  of  the  disciples  called  to  his  attention  (Me  13, If).  All 
these  things  show  that  Jesus  was  a  son  of  the  lower  social  scale 
that  knows  nothing  but  the  struggle  for  bread  which  engages 
all  its  energy. 

He  Loosten  joins  von  Hartmann  (see  above  p.  13f)  in  his 
complaint  against  the  personnel  of  Jesus’  following,  partic¬ 
ularly  the  female  element.  The  disciples  were  won  by  Jesus’ 
superior  moral  teaching,  but  it  was  the  pathological  element  in 
his  person  that  attracted  the  women  who  were  themselves  men¬ 
tally  afflicted  and  believed  themselves  healed  by  him.  Further, 
Jesus  was  a  sexuell  refraktaer  (S.  58).  He  pictured  the  future 
as  supersexual.  Alt  19,12  is  an  immortality  directly  dangerous 
to  the  state  (S.  59).  This  lack  of  sex  sensitiveness  combined 
with  the  absence  of  any  appreciation  of  the  family  as  an  insti¬ 
tution  is  a  mark  of  psychic  degeneration  par  excellence. 

How  frequently  Jesus  was  subject  to  hallucinations  dur¬ 
ing  the  course  of  his  career  we  do  not  know  and  we  cannot  say 
in  how  far  he  was  influenced  by  them.  HoAvever,  it  seems  very 
probable  that  he  was  quite  dependent  upon  them  for  his  deci¬ 
sions.  Experiences  similar  to  that  at  his  baptism  must  have 
repeated  themselves  frequently  (Lc  10,18)  ;  our  general  knowl¬ 
edge  of  this  abnormal  psychic  phenomenon  would  lead  us  to 
suppose  this.  Llis  disciples  were  occasionally  witnesses  of  this 
type  of  ecstatic  experience  which  he  enjoyed,  as  at  the  trans- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


75 


figuration  where  Jesus’  command  for  silence  indicates  his  own 
consciousness  of  the  pathological  moment  in  the  incident.  Lc 
9,36  represents  the  disciples  as  holding  their  peace  of  their 
own  accord.  Here  we  strike  a  Rasmussen  tone:  If  the  incid¬ 
ent  as  a  whole  had  been  uplifting  and  truly  religious,  one  that 
could  have  served  the  cause  of  Jesus,  they  (the  disciples)  would 
have  been  the  first  to  have  spread  the  report  of  it  far  and  wide , 
and  that  jubilantly  (S.  61).  Here  the  disciples  seem  to  have 
detected  the  pathological  background  of  Jesus’  experience  and 
voluntarily  held  their  peace.  That  Jesus’  hallucinations  were 
religious  in  character  and  content  is  to  be  explained  by  his 
predominant  religious  interests. 

A  mentally  abnormal  person  can  long  pass  for  healthy  and 
sound  with  those  who  know  him  best ;  if  they  do  discover  some¬ 
thing  wrong,  they  usually  seek  to  understand  sympathetically 
or  excuse  his  condition.  But  when  he  comes  out  of  his  local 
surroundings  where  he  is  less  known,  then  criticism  is  keener 
and  more  merciless.  That  Jesus  was  charged  with  mental  de¬ 
mentation  is  clear  from  Lc  4,23;  his  own  family  said  he  was 
beside  himself  (Me  3,21).  That  this  opinion  was  rather  wide¬ 
spread  is  evinced  by  Jn  8,48f  and  10,19ff.  On  Jn  7,19f  de 
Loosten  comments,  This  surprising  and  anxious  outcry  of 
Jesus  has  quite  the  marks  of  a  suddenly  appearing  delusion 
of  persecution  and  is  very  characteristic  of  the  tense  state  of 
soul  in  which  he  found  himself  at  this  time  (S.  62).  Me  3,22 
is  a  Synoptic  confirmation  of  the  general  opinion  concerning 
Jesus’  state  of  mental  health.  The  above  references  suffice  to 
show  that  Jesus  was  regarded  by  many  of  his  contemporaries 
as  actually  insane  and  that  from  this  fact  certain  conclusions 
can  be  drawn  regarding  the  personal  impression  made  by  him 
(S.  64). 

Jesus’  temper  was  by  no  means  uniformly  composed,  but 
seemed  to  rise  and  fall  according  to  the  successes  he  was  able 
to  register  against  his  opponents.  He  was  often  exposed  to 
peculiar  and  apparently  ungrounded  depressions  of  spirit  as 
Jn  12,27  shows.  His  word  in  connection  with  the  cure  of  the 
woman  with  an  issue  of  blood  in  Lc  8,46  (this  notice  is  not 
found  in  Mt’s  parallel,  and  is  not  a  word  of  Jesus  but  a  remark 


76 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


of  the  evangelist  in  Me  5,30)  testifies  to  an  abnormal  process 
of  perception.  He  had  some  sort  of  abnormal  peripheral  sen¬ 
sation ,  perhaps  in  the  cutaneous  field ,  and  sought  for  this  an 
explanation.  That  he  found  this  at  once  in  the  person  of  the 
afflicted  woman  is  a  mere  accident  which  he — shrewd  as  he  was 
— guarded  himself  against  declaring  as  such  (S.  66). 

Jesus  was  ruthless  in  his  disregard  for  the  religious  rites 
and  customs  of  his  people.  He  could  brook  no  opposition  and 
answered  objections  with  insult  and  sarcasm.  He  was  even  dis¬ 
courteous  in  his  remarks  to  his  more  distinguished  hosts.  He 
was  never  cautious  in  his  words  with  friend  or  foe.  It  is  not 
surprising  that  he  did  not  win  more  friends.  He  would  have 
had  a  greater  outward  success  if  he  had  unfurled  the  flag  of 
political  revolution,  but  Jesus  seems  to  have  lacked  all  talent 
for  organization.  Rather  than  augmenting  the  number  of  his 
following,  he  was  more  interested  in  binding  those  already  won 
more  closely  to  himself  by  awakening  within  them  exorbitant 
expectations  in  terms  of  Dan.  7,13f.  But  he  would  consider 
no  special  requests;  his  followers  must  take  what  came.  To 
share  in  the  future  glory  required  unconditional  subordination 
and  absolute  surrender  to  his  own  desires. 

Jesus’  lack  of  success  with  the  Jews  turned  him  to  the 
Gentiles;  by  a  dim  race  instinct  he  felt  himself  drawn  more 
strongly  to  the  Gentile  than  the  Jew.  As  he  grew  in¬ 
creasingly  unpopular  the  rash  thought  gradually  matured  in 
his  brain  of  carrying  out  by  himself  his  long  nourished  claims , 
which  he  had  expressed  in  a  thousand  ways ,  by  a  hind  of  king¬ 
dom  of  violence  (S.  72).  Had  Jesus  been  capable  of  sound  re¬ 
flection  he  would  never  have  undertaken  the  fatal  journey  to 
Jerusalem.  He  saw  clearly  that  his  star  was  about  to  set,  but 
the  impulse  within  him  drove  him  ahead  like  possessed.  How¬ 
ever,  he  did  not  neglect  to  prepare  his  disciples  for  a  possible 
defeat  in  Jerusalem  which  they  already  had  feared  as  is  clear 
in  the  anxious  undertone  of  Peter’s  word  in  Me  10,28.  In  his 
prophecies  of  the  passion  Jesus  trampled  the  Messianic  ideal 
of  his  people  under  his  feet;  for  this  they  could  not  forgive 
him,  and  they  were  too  sound-minded  to  take  any  pleasure  in 
the  Messiah’s  passive  passion. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


Ti 


During  his  Jerusalem  days  Jesus  found  himself  in  a  high- 
tensioned  and  excessively  nervous  state  of  mind.  It  is  o 
of  this  state  of  soul  that  his  senseless  cursing  of  the  fig  tree 
is  to  be  understood.  He  had  lost  the  calm  composure  of  his 
Galilean  days.  The  cleansing  of  the  temple  was  an  act  of 
striking  violence  and  branded  Jesus  as  dangerous  to  the  civil 
peace  in  the  e}Tes  of  his  Jerusalem  enemies.  The  Pharisees 
knew  that  the  plan  of  a  mentally  morbid  dreamer  for  a  social- 
religious  revolution  was  inadequate  to  the  situation.  Among 
the  disciples  Judas  alone  had  retained  a  clear  head,  and  his 
betrayal  and  subsequent  suicide  is  only  the  expression  of  his 
regret  for  having  wasted  his  time  and  energy  in  the  disciple- 
ship  of  Jesus. 

The  premonition  of  the  approaching  catastrophe  brought 
Jesus  into  a  state  of  deep  depression;  he  begins  to  distrust  the 
most  trusted  of  his  disciples.  His  unhealthful  fear  produced 
hallucinations  (Jn  12,28ff).  This  fear  reached  its  highest 
point  in  Gethsemane  where  Jesus  had  a  vision;  the  conscious¬ 
ness  of  his  mission,  in  which  he  had  believed  so  long  and  to 
which  he  had  sacrificed  the  best  of  his  life,  was  strong  enough 
to  overcome  the  fear  of  death  (S.  82).  In  his  words  at  his 
arrest  (Mt  26,5 Iff)  Jesus’  W  ahnsystem  suddenly  broke  forth 
again  with  all  its  former  force  and  he  regained  his  earlier  com¬ 
posure.  He  did  not  seek  to  detain  his  disciples  in  their  deser¬ 
tion  ;  he  knew  that  he  must  fight  the  battle  alone  and  he  entered 
the  conflict  with  a  royal  dignity  and  bearing  which  enabled  him 
to  greet  all  charges  during  his  trial  with  a  stony  silence.  Pilate 
did  not  regard  Jesus  as  a  dangerous  person,  rather  as  a  vision¬ 
ary,  a  fanatic,  a  morbid  mincl;  his  sympathy  for  Jesus’  piti¬ 
able  plight  is  expressed  in  Jn  19,5.  If  Lc  23,18  are  genuine 
words  of  Jesus,  it  is  certain  that  he  died  on  the  cross  without 
his  faith  in  his  own  Messiahship  being  broken  and  without  be¬ 
ing  shaken  from  his  happy  delusion. 

In  conclusion  de  Loosten  says :  Suffering  from  birth  on 
under  hereditary  burden  Jesus  was  probably  a  half-caste,  who 
as  a  born  degenerate  attracted  attention  even  in  early  youth 
by  his  exceedingly  pronounced  self-consciousness  which  was 


nly  out 


78 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


combined  with  a  highly  gifted  intelligence  and  a  meagerly  de¬ 
veloped  sense  for  family  and  sex  (S.  90). 

These  elements  of  degeneration  determined  the  course  of 
Jesus’  public  career;  first  subjectively;  later  objectively.  His 
intelligence  enabled  him  to  recognize  the  mistakes  of  the  relig¬ 
ious  conceptions  that  controlled  his  time  and  to  give  to  the  pre¬ 
cepts  of  the  law  an  interpretation  that  was  new  in  form,  freer 
and  capable  of  development. 

His  self-consciousness  was  aggravated  in  a  slow  process 
of  development  that  ended  in  a  fixed  system  of  delusions,  the 
particulars  of  which  were  determined  by  the  intense  religious 
bent  of  the  time  and  his  own  one-sided  preoccupation  with  the 
Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament.  The  physiologic  genial  and 
the  pathological  elements  in  his  nature  influenced  each  other 
strongly  and  were  intimately  combined  (S.  90). 

In  the  course  of  his  public  career  the  more  pathological 
element  in  Jesus’  person  smothered  out  the  more  healthy  ele¬ 
ment.  Jesus’  psychic  disturbance  manifested  itself  in  halluc¬ 
inations  in  more  than  one  field  of  sense,  and  their  character  and 
content  always  corresponded  to  the  nature  of  his  delusion. 
Jesus’  end  came  as  the  result  of  the  inevitable  clash  between 
Wahn  und  Wirklichkeit  (S.  91). 

There  is  a  seriousness  and  conscientiousness  in  de  Loost- 
en’s  book  that  we  missed  in  Rasmussen’s  Jesus.  The  very  fact 
that  Dr.  Lomer  wrote  under  a  pseudonym  is  evidence  enough 
that  he  was  not  seeking  notoriety,  a  charge  from  which  Ras¬ 
mussen  would  have  difficulty  in  freeing  himself.  Over  against 
the  others  who  have  figured  in  the  contention  against  the  psy¬ 
chic  health  of  Jesus  de  Loosten  stands  alone  in  his  recognition 
and  high  estimate  of  the  remarkable  intellectual  abilities  of 
Jesus.  He  classes  Jesus  among  the  great  geniuses  of  history. 

Although  de  Loosten  states  that  his  purpose  is  not  to  write 
a  life  of  Jesus,  his  book  is  in  fact  a  pathography  of  Jesus  for 
he  comments  in  one  way  or  another  upon  nearly  every  import¬ 
ant  word  or  incident  in  Jesus’  public  career.  De  Loosten  is 
really  the  first  pathographer  of  Jesus.  He  makes  no  definite 
diagnosis  in  the  case  of  Jesus,  but  his  conclusions  fit  paranoia 
only. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


79 


The  chief  weakness  of  de  Loosten  is  his  complete  lack  of 
orientation  in  the  field  of  New  Testament  criticism.  He  rejects 
the  canonical  birth  stories  of  Mt  and  Lc,  and  places  consider¬ 
able  confidence  in  the  slanders  of  Celsus  and  the  Talmud.  He 
cites  the  apoci'3rphal  Gospels  of  Thomas,  Hebrews,  Ebionites, 
Egyptians  and  Peter.  The  Fourth  Gospel  furnishes  him  the 
greater  bulk  of  his  materials.  The  petty  character  of  many 
of  his  criticisms  is  illustrated  by  his  remark  on  Jesus’  word  in 
the  contention  concerning  the  washing  of  hands  (Me  7,1_~3)  : 
Is  not  one  rightly  accustomed  to  judge  the  stage  of  any  peo¬ 
ple's  culture  by  its  use  of  soap?  (S.  68).  But  when  de  Loosten 
tells  us  that  Jesus  opened  his  ministry  in  Nazareth,  that  he  sub¬ 
ordinated  his  message  to  his  miracles,  that  his  own  ego  was  the 
theme  of  his  parables,  and  that  Jesus  experienced  a  vision  on 
the  mount  of  transfiguration,  we  need  only  to  reply  that  de 
Loosten  would  do  well  to  read  the  Gospels  again. 

William  Hirsch,  M.  I). 

Hirsch’s  book,  Religion  and  Civilization :  the  Conclusions 
of  a  Psychiatrist  (Truth  Seeker  Company,  N.  Y.,  1912,  610 
p.)  appeared  in  German  in  1910  under  the  title,  Religion  und 
Civilisation  vom  Stand punkte  des  Psychiaters  (E.  W.  Bonsels 
8z  Co.,  Muenchen,  652  S.)  Hirsch  is  a  doctor  of  medicine  in 
New  York,  a  specialist  in  mental  diseases,  and  a  free-thinker. 
His  general  view  of  religion  corresponds  more  closely  to  that 
of  Washburn  than  to  that  of  any  other  writer  who  has  pro¬ 
nounced  a  psychiatric  judgment  against  Jesus.  His  reason¬ 
ing  is  characteristically  free-thinking.  He  knows  that  there 
is  no  God,  no  son  of  God,  no  soul,  and  no  such  thing  as  immor¬ 
tality.  Religion  is  a  remainder  of  barbarism  (p.  599,  Ger., 
648).  No  matter  what  form  religion  took,  it  has  always  been 
an  evil;  it  has  either  kept  mankind  ignorant  and  stupid,  or  made 
them  hypocrites . Religion  of  the  present  is  like  a  poison¬ 

ous  hydra,  whose  venomous  tooth  has  been  drawn  by  civiliza¬ 
tion  (p.  593,  Ger.,  641f).  Christianity  was  the  greatest  hind¬ 
rance,  the  most  persistent  obstacle  that  civilization  has  had  to 
overcome  (p.  592,  Ger.,  640).  Christianity,  from  its  very  be¬ 
ginning,  was  a  curse  and  blight  to  the  human  race  (p.  453f, 


80 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Ger.,  487).  It  has  kept  mankind  in  a  state  of  stupidity  and 
superstition  for  nearly  two  thousand  years  (p.  526,  Ger.,  566). 
The  Christian  religion  has  always  exerted  an  exceedingly  un¬ 
favorable  influence  on  the  morals  of  mankind.  Hard  as  this 

may  seem,  it  is  nevertheless  true . the  less  Christianity,  the 

higher  the  morals  (p.  542,  Ger.,  583). 

It  is  only  the  psychiatric  portions  of  the  book,  particu¬ 
larly  those  in  reference  to  Jesus,  that  are  of  interest  to  us 
here.  Hirsch  finds  that  the  science  of  psychiatry  is  not  yet 
sufficiently  appreciated  as  furnishing  a  correct  account  for 
certain  historical  phenomena.  Since  the  earliest  times  mental 
diseases  have  exerted  an  enormous  influence  on  the  develop¬ 
ment  of  mankind,  and  there  are  many  great  historical  events 
which  cannot  be  understood  at  all  without  a  psychiatrical  ex¬ 
planation  (p.  Ill,  Ger.,  I).  This  is  especially  true  in  giving 
an  historical  account  of  the  rise  and  history  of  Old  Testament 
religion,  as  well  as  the  beginnings  of  Christianity.  Biblical 
phenomena  are  given  a  complete  a?id  exhaustive  explanation  by 
the  assumption  of  mental  diseases  (p.  IV,  Ger.,  III). 

The  biblical  accounts  in  their  entirety  are  to  be  taken  as 
strict  historical  facts.  The  undeniable  proof  that  all  the  pro¬ 
minent  personages  from  Abraham  down  to  Paul  actually  lived 
and  that  all  that  is  related  about  them  actually  happened  is  as 
follows:  Mental  diseases,  like  all  the  other  phenomena  of  nat¬ 
ure,  have  quite  a  typical,  unmistakable  character  to  the  expert. 
To  invent  a  psychical  condition,  corresponding  in  all  its  details 
to  the  actual  course  of  a  well-known  mental  disease,  is  just  as 
impossible  as  to  describe  the  course  of  typhoid  fever  or  malaria 
without  ever  having  seen  or  heard  anything  about  these  dis¬ 
eases.  The  description  given  in  the  Bible  of  the  persons  in 
question  corresponds  so  accurately  to  a  certain  form  of  insan¬ 
ity  which  we  have  occasion  to  observe  every  day  that  the  proof 
that  these  people  must  have  existed  has  hereby  been  presented 
beyond  any  doubt  (p.  V,  Ger.,  IHf). 

The  mental  disease  in  question,  which  has  played  such  an 
important  role  in  the  domain  of  religion,  is  paranoia.  This 
form  of  insanity  is  as  old  as  the  human  race,  but  it  was  only 
during  the  last  century  that  it  began  to  be  understood.  The 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


81 


remarkable  thing  about  this  mental  disturbance  is  that  it  does 
not  necessarily  involve  an  impairment  of  the  intellect.  Par¬ 
anoiacs  often  manifest  an  unusually  high  degree  of  intelligence 
and  are  often  gifted  and  talented.  They  do  not  present  the 
ordinary  symptoms  of  insanity,  such  as  incoherent  speech, 
chattering,  absurd  acts,  attacks  of  fury,  etc.  Apparently 
they  are  healthy,  veil-bred  persons  and  not  infrequently  make 
a  decidedly  favorable  impression  by  their  charm  of  manner  and 
speech.  Their  judgment  seems  clear  and  correct,  and  their 
emotions  normal.  Yet  a  whole  multitude  of  morbid  psychical 
phenomena  lies  hidden  behind  this  seemingly  normal  mental 
state.  (On  paranoia  see  below  pages  257fi). 

For  Kirsch,  all  the  Old  Testament  personages,  Abraham, 
Isaac,  Jacob,  Moses  (the  most  ingenious  of  them  all  about  whose 
paranoia  whole  books  could  be  written),  Gideon,  Samuel,  Saul, 
all  the  prophets  from  Isaiah  down  to  Malachi,  whose  ’writings 
represent  nothing  but  the  confused  and  incoherent  manifesta¬ 
tions  of  an  unbalanced  mind,  are  nothing  other  than  typical 
clinical  cases  of  paranoia  such  as  are  found  in  our  hospitals 
for  the  insane  today.  The  three  chief  figures  connected  with 
the  beginnings  of  Christianity,  John  the  Baptist,  Jesus,  and 
Paul,  were  also  paranoiacs.  All  the  biblical  characters  from 
Abraham  down  to  Paul  suffered  with  delusions  of  grandeur  and 
persecution  and  with  hallucinations  in  every  field  of  sense.  The 
psychiatrist  can  account  for  these  phenomena,  so  well  known 
to  him,  only  by  the  assumption  of  paranoia. 

Hirsch  repeats  the  position  of  Rasmussen  to  the  effect 
that  the  old  alternative,  that  Jesus  was  either  the  one  he  pro¬ 
fessed  to  be  or  he  was  the  greatest  swindler  that  ever  lived,  is 
false.  There  can  be  no  question  about  Jesus’  sincerity:  Christ 
was  thoroughly  honest  and  was  convinced  himself  of  the  truth 
of  every  word  he  uttered  (p.  91,  Ger.,  89).  The  whole  of  his 
conduct,  his  attitude  toward  his  contemporaries,  and  the  ac¬ 
counts  of  him  handed  down  to  us  prove  that  he  was  neither  an 
adventurer  nor  an  impostor.  Some  of  his  contemporaries  did 
him  a  great  injustice  in  this  respect.  There  is  a  third  possibil¬ 
ity  which  saves  Jesus’  sincerity  and  frees  him  from  fraud,  that 
is,  he  was  a  paranoiac. 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


82 

Regarding  the  sources  Hirsch  takes  the  same  position  as 
Rinet-Sangle,  as  we  shall  see,  and  accepts  all  four  Gospels  as 
literal  history  down  to  the  last  detail :  Every  sentence  in  the 
Gospel  rests  on  the  solid  foundation  of  a  historical  fact  (p.  98, 
Ger.,  95).  What ,  in  our  estimation ,  forms  a  much  stronger 
proof  of  the  truth  of  the  Gospel  than  anything  else,  is  the  fact 
that  the  entire  psychical  manifestations  of  Jesus  Christ  repre¬ 
sent  a  certain  mental  condition,  to  be  analysed  at  once,  which 
is  so  characteristic  and  typical  in  every  respect,  that  it  seems 
utterly  impossible  that  these  utterances  could  have  been  invent¬ 
ed  by  any  one  (p.  99,  Ger.,  95). 

Jesus,  for  Hirsch,  offers  in  every  respect  an  absolutely 
typical  picture  of  paranoia.  All  that  we  know  of  him  corre¬ 
sponds  so  exactly  to  the  clinical  aspect  of  paranoia,  that  it  is 
hardly  conceivable  how  anybody  at  all  acquainted  with  mental 
disorders,  can  entertain  the  slightest  doubt  as  to  the  correct¬ 
ness  of  the  diagnosis  (p.  103,  Ger.,  99).  Jesus  was  one  of  those 
cases  of  paranoia  that  remain  quiet  and  self-engrossed  during 
youth.  He  could  be  called  a  prodigy  in  view  of  his  unusual 
mental  ability  manifested  at  the  age  of  twelve.  The  seeds  of 
the  delusion  that  later  possessed  him  were  sown  in  his  youthful 
brain  by  his  arduous  study  of  the  prophets.  Anyone  acquainted 
with  the  writings  of  the  insane  Prophets,  anyone  who  has 
been  able  to  read  through  this  endless  chaos  of  delusions,  these 
incoherent  products  of  a  hallucinatory  delirium,  must  be  able 
to  realize  what  a  pernicious  influence  the  eager  study  of  them 
?nust  have  exerted  on  a  juvenile  mind,  predisposed  itself  to  psy¬ 
chopathic  conditions  (p.  103,  Ger.,  99). 

The  first  developments  of  his  delusions  were  slow  and  im¬ 
perceptible  to  Jesus’  friends.  The  obscurity  that  shrouds  the 
life  of  Jesus  before  the  time  of  his  public  appearance  makes 
it  impossible  to  determine  when  these  delusions  first  appeared 
and  began  to  systematize  themselves.  They  were  probably  more 
or  less  latent  and  had  not  come  into  permanent  possession  of 
his  self-consciousness.  Otherwise  they  would  have  forced  him 
out  of  his  seclusion.  He  obviously  constituted  one  of  those 
cases,  where  the  isolated  and  disconnected  delusions  required  an 
external  stimulant  and  a  strong  emotion  to  systematize  them- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


83 


selves  into  a  typical  paranoical  structure  (p.  104,  Ger.,  100). 
This  stimulant  was  furnished  by  John  the  Baptist  and  his 
preaching.  Jesus’  baptism  by  John  aroused  him  to  a  condi¬ 
tion  of  intense  emotional  excitement ;  his  long  cherished  delu¬ 
sions  were  converted  into  hallucinations  of  sight  and  hearing. 
The  hallucinations  of  paranoiacs  are  always  materialized  deho- 
sions  (p.  105,  Ger.,  101). 

The  subsequent  sojourn  of  forty  days  in  the  wilderness  is 
of  greatest  interest,  for  these  forty  days  lie  between  two  funda¬ 
mentally  different  periods  in  the  life  of  Jesus.  Jesus  returned 
from  the  wilderness  a  different  person;  an  enormous  change  had 
taken  place  in  his  psychic  condition.  The  delusions ,  until  then 
isolated  and  disconnected ,  had  expanded  and  combined  and 
formed  themselves  into  a  great  systematized  structure  (p.  106, 
Ger.,  102).  This  transition  corresponds  to  the  regular  course 
of  this  psychosis;  it  is  the  transition  from  the  latent  to  the  ac¬ 
tive  stage  of  paranoia.  During  the  rest  of  his  life  Jesus  was 
possessed  with  immeasurable,  perpetually  increasing  delusions 
of  grandeur.  All  of  his  thoughts  and  words  culminated  in  the 
one  word  “I.”  Jesus’  I  ams  are  as  typical  chatter  of  a  paran¬ 
oiac  as  could  be  found.  Most  of  his  parables  have  reference 
to  his  own  person  (Hirseh  cites  Jn  10, 7f).  Everything  revolves 
solely  and  alone  about  his  “Ego,”  and  the  delusions  that  center 
on  this  “Ego”  know  no  limit.  Jesus’  prayer  in  Jn  17, Iff  fur¬ 
nishes  proof  of  his  paranoia  in  every  word.  His  very  relation 
to  “God”  as  his  “Father”  is  gradually  obliterated  in  his  delu¬ 
sions,  and  he  begins  to  consider  himself  God  (p.  110,  Ger.,  107). 
Like  a  long  drawn  out  crescendo  in  a  Beethoven  symphony,  be¬ 
ginning  with  the  faintest  pianissimo  and  gradually  expanding 
more  and  more ,  growing  in  intensity  with  every  movement  until 
it  reaches,  in  a  thundering  fortissimo,  its  highest  climax,  so 
Jesus  Christ's  delusions  of  grandeur  began  slowly,  developing 
step  by  step,  until  they  finally  assumed  such  dimensions  that 
further  intensification  became  impossible  (p.  Ill,  Ger.,  108). 
A  o  text  book  on  mental  diseases  can  give  a  more  typical  de¬ 
scription  of  delusions  of  grandeur ,  gradually  developing  and 
infinitely  increasing ,  than  is  offered  by  the  life  of  Jesus  Christ 
(p.  112,  Ger.,  109). 


84 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Jesus  not  only  suffered  with  delusions,  but  also  with  hal¬ 
lucinations  ;  he  saw  and  heard  the  creations  of  his  own  morbid 
imagination  (the  baptism,  temptation,  and  transfiguration). 
We  have  record  of  at  least  one  illusion  (Jn  12,28f),  which  is 
psychologically  closely  akin  to  the  hallucination. 

Jesus’  diseased  mental  condition  showed  itself  in  most  every 
thing  he  did.  His  selection  of  the  twelve  is  evidence  enough 
of  his  Groessenwahn.  His  acclamation  in  Mt  ll,25ff  (Lc  10, 
21  ff)  is  his  paranoiacal  interpretation  of  the  fact  that  he  was 
rejected  by  the  elite  among  his  contemporaries  and  was  accepted 
by  the  proletariat;  his  words  in  Lc  10,19  and  Jn  9,3 — 
How  typical  of  paranoia!  No  one  but  a  paranoiac  would  curse 
a  barren  fig  tree  for  its  failure  to  bear  fruit  out  of  season,  or 
undertake  such  a  foolhardy  entrance  into  the  capital. 

Jesus’  miracles  are  not  at  all  remarkable ;  they  are  to  be 
explained  by  suggestion  and  auto-suggestion.  Jesus  did  not 
really  cure;  his  supposed  cures  were  cases  of  suffering  from 
imaginary  health.  It  is  almost  pathetic  how  he  smeared  saliva 
and  earth  into  the  eyes  of  a  blind  man ,  believing  that  thereby 
he  had  cured  him  (p.  121,  Ger.,  119).  The  miracle  at  Cana  is 
a  slight-of-hand  trick  to  which  no  self-respecting  God  would 
stoop.  Jesus  deluded  himself,  as  did  his  disciples,  into  think¬ 
ing  that  he  miraculously  multiplied  food  and  fed  the  multi¬ 
tudes;  the  litter  left  in  a  New  York  park  after  a  Jewish  picnic 
will  explain  the  basketsful  of  fragments. 

That  the  apostles,  headed  by  Peter,  asked  Jesus  why  he 
called  himself  the  Son  of  God,  in  that  he  was  really  the  son  of 
Joseph  and  Mary,  and  that  this  subject  was  frequently  dis¬ 
cussed  in  detail  with  him  is  a  matter  of  absolute  certaint}^  for 
Hirsch.  Jesus  evidently  answered  that  God  was  his  father, 
and  not  Joseph,  and  that  he  had  been  born  of  a  virgin  mother 
by  divine  miracle.  For  Hirsch,  Jesus  is  the  originator  of  the 
legends  of  the  wonderful  events  that  attended  his  birth  as  re¬ 
lated  in  the  narratives  of  the  nativity  by  Mt  and  Lc.  These 
fanciful  creations  were  constructed  by  him  after  he  had  become 
obsessed  by  the  delusion  of  grandeur  that  he  was  the  son  of 
God.  That  Jesus  was  one  of  those  cases  of  paranoia  that 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


85 


ascribe  to  themselves  a  distinguished  ancestry  is  clear  from 
his  fabrication  of  the  fictitious  paternal  genealogies. 

Jesus’  paranoia  is  further  clear  from  the  eccentric  and 
absurd  character  of  his  teaching.  His  words  concerning  the 
other  cheek  and  the  mantle  also  are  ridiculous.  Jesus  is  in¬ 
different  to  the  moral  and  ethical  considerations  in  the  living  of 
life  as  long  as  his  disciples  will  only  continue  to  believe  on  him. 
If  his  instructions  regarding  labor  and  provision  for  the  future 
were  followed  it  would  mean  a  retrogression  to  the  prehistoric 
condition  of  man!  A  negation  of  all  civilization !  (p.  132,  Ger., 
132).  Jesus  did  not  conform  his  conduct  to  his  own  teaching 
regarding  love  for  one’s  enemies;  no  one  could  be  more  intoler¬ 
ant  toward  his  enemies  than  Jesus,  He  cursed  cities  neck  and 
crop ,  yet  in  his  last  moments  on  the  cross  he  could  promise 
Paradise  to  a  criminal;  and  all  because  the  one  believed  and  the 
other  disbelieved  in  him.  Jesus’  whole  code  of  ethics  rests  up¬ 
on  blind  faith.  In  view  of  such  utterances  as  Mt  10,37  and 
Lc  14.26  the  diagnosis  of  a  mental  disease  is  charitable.  Men¬ 
tal  derangement  is  the  only  excuse  for  his  inconsiderate  words 
and  haughty  attitude  toward  his  mother. 

Like  all  paranoiacs  Jesus  harbored  hatred  for  those  who 
did  not  agree  with  him  or  humor  him  in  his  delusions.  His  atti¬ 
tude  toward  the  rich  is  absurd.  He  had  not  the  slightest  no¬ 
tion  of  a  social  system  of  any  kind.  The  point  to  his  parable 
of  the  rich  man  and  Lazarus  is  a  demoralizing  and  pernicious 
doctrine.  Jesus’  mental  condition  led  him  to  the  crassest  con¬ 
tradictions.  In  the  parable  of  the  pounds  he  advises  us  to  be¬ 
come  Shylocks.  In  his  own  conduct  he  did  not  manifest  the 
indiscriminate  mercy  which  he  idealizes  in  the  parable  of  the 
good  Samaritan,  for  in  Mt  10,5  he  instructs  his  disciples  to 
avoid  the  cities  of  Samaria  and  the  ways  of  the  Gentiles. 

Jesus’  habit  of  expressing  himself  in  superlatives  was  the 
result  of  his  psychic  degeneration.  His  passion  for  self-muti¬ 
lation  is  abominable  and  grossly  immoral.  As  is  so  frequently 
the  case  with  psychical  degenerates ,  Christ  was  sexually  im¬ 
potent  (p.  530,  Ger.,  571).  His  commandment  Thou  shalt  love 
thine  enemies  is  another  of  those  psychological  impossibilities 
which  originated  in  the  morbid  desire  to  outdo  the  existing  law 


86 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


(p.  531f,  Ger.,  572).  All  his  proposed  changes  in  the  Mosiac 
laws  actually  sound  like  persiflage. 

Jesus  replied  to  the  Pharisees  in  Lc  13,31f  in  a  genuine 
paranoiacal  fashion,  for  he  saw  in  their  advice  only  a  new  con¬ 
spiracy  against  himself.  During  his  trial  Jesus  conducted  him¬ 
self  in  the  same  insane  manner;  at  that  time  the  High-Priest 
who  knew  nothing  of  mental  diseases ,  there  being  no  chair  of 
psychiatry  in  Jerusalem,  could  naturally  see  only  a  blasphemy 
in  Jesus'  utterances  (p.  155,  Ger.,  157). 

Hirsch  concludes  his  study  of  Jesus  in  the  conviction  that 
any  one  not  forcibly  opposed  to  admitting  the  truth  cannot 
longer  be  in  doubt  concerning  Jesus’  paranoia.  He  represents 
as  typical  a  case  of  this  disease  as  can  be  imagined.  All  the 
symptoms  are  fully  represented,  and  the  development  as  well 
as  the  course  of  this  case  corresponds  in  every  respect  to  the 
well-known  description  which  modern  psychiatry,  based  on 
many  years'  clinical  experience,  has  given  of  this  peculiar  psy¬ 
chical  affection  (p.  129,  Ger.,  128).  The  whole  Christian  world 
worships  an  insane  Jew  who  was  crucified  two  thousand  years 
ago. 

The  average  Christian  believer  who  reads  Hirsch’s  book 
will  without  doubt  receive  a  severe  shock.  But  the  student  of 
Biblical  literature  takes  his  work  much  less  seriously.  Hirsch’s 
book  is  too  full  of  back-ally  mud-throwing  from  the  religious 
point  of  view  to  make  any  real  impression.  Even  from  the 
psychiatric  angle  it  has  nothing  of  the  serious  scientific  char¬ 
acter  that  one  has  a  right  to  expect  of  a  doctor  of  medicine. 
Along  with  the  others  who  diagnose  paranoia  Hirsch  is  abso¬ 
lutely  indiscriminate  in  his  use  of  sources,  drawing  most  of  his 
material  from  the  Fourth  Gospel,  and  he  shows  himself  abso¬ 
lutely  unacquainted  with  the  conclusions  of  Biblical  criticism. 

Dr.  C.  Binet-Sangle 

Dr.  Binet-Sangle,  Professor  in  the  School  of  Psychology 
in  Paris,  tells  us  near  the  close  of  the  fourth  volume  of  his 
work,  La  Folie  de  Jesus ,  (I  Tomes,  Paris,  1908 — 1915;  1914 
p.)  that  he  read  the  canonical  Gospels  for  the  first  time 
in  1898.  Prior  to  that  time  he  had  known  Ieschou  bar-Iossef 
{Jesus,  son  of  Joseph.  Throughout  his  work  Binet-Sangle  in- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


87 


sists  on  using  the  transliterated  form  of  Biblical  names.)  only 
as  presented  in  works  such  as  that  of  Renan,  and  he  was  sur¬ 
prised  beyond  measure  to  find  the  great  disparity  that  existed 
between  the  portrait  by  Renan  and  the  actual  model  furnished 
by  the  Gospels  themselves  (1).  On  the  very  first  read¬ 
ing  of  the  Gospels  he  was  convinced  that  Jesus  was  an 
alien  and  that  the  Christian  religion  had  for  its  founder 
a  psychopath  whom  five  hundred  millions  of  men  worship  as 
divine.  Provoked  by  these  first  impressions  he  began  his  study. 
In  1902  he  published  an  article,  Les  cures  mir aculeuse s  de  Jesus , 
in  the  Revue  Blanche  (June  15  and  July  1).  In  1903  he  wrote 
a  lecture  on  Les  hallucinations  de  Jesus  which  he  revised  in  1905 
and  now  comprises  part  IV  of  volume  II  of  his  finished  work. 
In  January  1907  he  began  a  series  of  lectures  on  La  Folie  de 
Jesus  in  the  School  of  Psychology  in  Paris  which  he  gave  on 
Saturdays  and  continued  through  three  winters  before  students 
of  medicine  and  philosophy.  The  first  volume  of  his  work  ap¬ 
peared  in  1908  and  the  fourth  and  last  in  1915.  (See  biblio¬ 
graphy  for  the  editions  of  the  various  volumes  from  which 
quotations  are  made.) 

Before  examining  the  contents  of  Binet-Sangle’s  wmrk  it 
is  necessary  to  state  briefly  his  general  view  of  religion  and  his 
philosophical  position  in  order  to  comprehend  the  ease  with 
which  he  pronounces  such  harsh  judgments  against  Jesus.  In 
his  atheistic  confession  he  says  that  belief  in  either  God  or  devil 
seems  to  him  absurd,  and,  since  the  world  at  present  is  enjoy¬ 
ing  the  age  of  reason,  he  is  completely  delivered  from  all  need 
of  faith.  No  religious  idea  seems  to  me  to  merit  the  inquiry  of 
an  intelligent  person  (IV  323).  Religious  devotion  is  a  mark 
of  psychic  degeneration.  Philosophically  Binet-Sangle  is  a 
determinist.  and  materialist.  Psychology  is  merely  a  branch  of 
ph  ysiology  and  biology.  There  is  no  ego,  no  free  will;  both  are 
delusions.  The  free  will,  the  spontaneity  of  the  ego,  autonom¬ 
ous  volition  are  only  illusions.  1  is  only  a  word.  It  designates 
the  conscious  element  of  our  being,  infamous  element,  governed 

(1)  Quelle  difference  en  effet  entre  le  charmant  pliilosophe  de  la  “ Vie 
de  Jesus”  et  le  vagabond  hautain,  farouche  et  incoherent  des  evangiles  I 
IV  331. 


88 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


by  subconsciousness,  the  organism,  and  the  outside  world . 

Man  is  a  machine  partially  endowed  with  consciousness ;  and  he 
imagines  that  he  has  within  himself  the  power  and  direction  of 
his  acts,  but  zcho  in  reality  is  acted  upon  by  all  the  forces  of 
the  universe.  Irresponsible  for  his  constitution,  his  tempera¬ 
ment,  his  character  and  the  environment  in  which  hazard  has 
placed  him,  man  is  the  plaything  of  events  as  the  planet  on 
which  he  lives  is  the  plaything  of  the  stars.  All  acts,  mental, 
muscular  and  moral,  draw  their  energy  from  the  depths  of  the 
organism  and  are  as  rigorously  determined  as  the  rebounding 
of  a  ball  thrown  against  a  wall.  Ethics  has  only  an  illusory 
efficacy.  It  should  be  replaced  by  eugenics  and  social  hygiene 
(TV  72f).  The  ignoramus,  the  hypocrite,  the  liar  and  the  cri¬ 
minal  are  as  little  responsible  for  their  feelings  and  acts  as  the 
electric  machine  is  responsible  for  its  sparks  and  flashes,  the 
injuries  and  deaths  which  it  can  cause  (I  5). 

In  his  previous  studies  in  morbid  religious  psychology  (1), 
Binet-Sangle  expressed  his  judgment  to  the  effect  that,  if  the 
prophets  had  lived  in  our  da}7,  many  of  them  would  have  been 
interned  in  our  asylums  for  the  mentally  diseased,  for  they,  with 
all  the  religious  by  vocation,  belong  to  the  family  of  the  psy- 
chopaths.  The  same  is  true  of  this  Jesus,  son  of  Joseph,  of 
this  Jesus  Christ  of  whom  we  have  made  a  god  (I  I).  The 
scholar  has  the  right  to  study  the  founders  of  the  great  relig¬ 
ions  without  entertaining  for  them  a  special  sentiment  of  rev¬ 
erence  or  love  which  their  work  does  not  justify.  As  a  psycho¬ 
logist  he  intends  to  employ  the  method  of  all  natural  sciences, 
since  human  psychology  is  merely  a  branch  of  anthropology. 
As  the  naturalist,  the  psychologist  must  observe,  compare,  gen¬ 
eralize,  and  infer.  II  ne  doit  jamais  employer  la  petition  de 
principe  (I  9).  He  regards  almost  all  the  writers  who  have 
studied  Jesus  as  having  employed  this  false  method.  He  does 
not  intend  to  study  Jesus  as  would  a  Catholic  or  a  Protestant 
theologian,  nor  as  a  mythologist.  but  as  an  anthropologist,  and 
to  prove  that  for  1900  years  occidental  humanity  has  lived 
under  the  ban  of  a  mistaken  diagnosis. 

(1)  Les  proph&tes  juifs,  1905;  Le  prophete  Elie,  1904;  Le  propJiete 
Elisee,  1905;  Observations  de  religieuses  de  vocation. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


89 


Regarding  the  trustworthiness  of  the  sources  (I  20-71) 
Binet-Sangle  says  that  the  evangelists  were  not  inventors  of  fic¬ 
tions,  but  historians  and  biographers.  If  they  were  inventors, 
they  were  admirably  instructed  in  nervous  and  mental  pathol¬ 
ogy  ;  but  this  science  was  not  yet  born  when  they  wrote.  The 
Gospel  writers  were  honest  men  who  saw  develop  before  their 
eyes,  without  knowing  its  nature,  a  case  of  theomegalomania, 
a  case  of  religious  paranoia,  and  they  naively  described  what 
they  saw.  He  will  prove  his  position  step  by  step  in  a  detailed 
examination  of  the  canonical  Gospels,  the  fourth  being  of 
equal  historical  reliability  and  value  as  the  first'  three.  He 
will  not  employ  the  apocryphal  gospels,  but  merely  cite  them 
in  the  foot-notes  as  a  kind  of  superfluous  sub-support  to  the 
abundant  psychopathic  materials  found  in  the  four  Gospels 
as  they  at  present  stand  in  the  New  Testament. 

Son  Heredite  (I  73-200) 

Concerning  Jesus’  father  we  know  very  little.  -His  affec¬ 
tion  for  his  son  is  perhaps  reflected  in  Jesus’  parable  in  Mt  7,9 
(Lc  11,11).  He  probably  did  not  live  to  see  the  insanity  of  his 
son  enter  upon  its  active  phase.  It  is  certain  that  he  did  not 
live  to  witness  the  death  of  the  theomaniac,  for  Jesus  consigns 
his  mother  to  the  care  of  the  beloved  disciple  (Jn  19,26f). 
Jesus’  mother  was  very  devout,  yet,  as  all  the  women  of  the 
tune,  very  ignorant.  She  was  not  slow  in  perceiving  the  de¬ 
mented  state  of  her  son ;  it  is  this  painful  realization  that  she 
hid  away  in  her  heart  (Lc  2,51).  Nevertheless  she  manifested 
a  true  mother-love  for  her  son ;  this  he  did  not  return.  She 
remained  in  the  shadow  where  Jesus  relegated  her,  sharing  with 
him  his  joys,  fears,  and  sorrows.  Pity  the  mothers  who  give 
Jesus  as  an  example  to  their  sons !  (I  111).  Mary  did  not 
abandon  her  son,  but  followed  him  throughout  his  errant  life. 
She  believed  in  his  divine  mission  and  was  a  member  of  the  secte 
ieschouite. 

Jesus’  family  was  one  of  those  of  which  Billod  says:  II  doit 
y  avoir  ou  y  avoir  eu  des  alienes  dans  la  famille  (quoted  by 
Binet-Sangle,  I  131).  The  brothers  of  Jesus  can  be  divided 
into  two  clans :  the  Messianic  which  believed  in  his  divine  mis- 


90 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


sion,  and  the  anti-Messianic  which  disbelieved.  Me  3, SI  makes 
it  clear  that  the  brothers  of  Jesus  who  were  still  of  sound  mind 
were  under  no  delusion  as  to  the  true  nature  of  their  brother’s 
words  and  acts.  Judas  (Me  6,3)  belonged  to  the  second  clan, 
and  Jacob  (James)  to  the  first.  Jacob  was  a  mystic  tempera¬ 
ment;  he  believed  in  Jesus’  messianic  mission  and  shared  in 
the  resurrection  hallucinations  (I  Cor  15,7).  He  was  later  the 
fanatical,  yet  vacillatory  head  of  the  Jerusalem  community. 
Jesus  and  Jacob  constitute  a  psychopathic  pair,  a  case  of  folie 
religieuse  a  deux,  in  which  the  active  subject  (Jesus)  commun¬ 
icates  his  delirium  to  the  passive  subject  (Jacob).  Jacob  was 
a  psychic  degenerate,  un  regressif  hyper  suggestible  (I  153). 
Jacob  was  younger  than  Jesus,  as  is  usually  the  case  in  the 
communication  of  mental  contagions,  and  possessed  essentially 
the  same  personal  characteristics,  and  shared  common  condi¬ 
tions  of  life;  he  was  Valiene  par  reflet,  Valiene  par  induction, 
un  demi-fou  (I  156ff).  This  religious  epidemic  which  first  af¬ 
fected  the  mind  of  a  blood-brother  has  spread  over  the  whole 
western  world  and  we  call  it  Christianity. 

In  the  less  immediate  family  of  Jesus  Binet-Sangle  reckons 
Simon,  son  of  Clopas,  as  the  blood-cousin  of  Jesus  (his  mother, 
Mary,  being  the  sister  of  Joseph,  Jesus’  father)  and  as  iden¬ 
tical  with  the  Cephas  of  I  Cor  15,5  who  shared  in  the  resur¬ 
rection  visions  thus  adding  a  third  psychopath  to  the  group. 
The  family  of  Jesus,  composed  of  thirteen  members  according 
to  Binet-Sangle’s  calculations,  forms  a  psychopathic  group, 
which  he  calls  a  hierosyncroteme  (sacred  group),  in  which 
there  are  found  one  fou  religieux,  two  demi-fous  religieux,  and 
four  devots ,  all  seven  mystics  (I  198).  Thus  Joseph  and  Mary- 
engendered  a  theomegalomaniac,  un  fou,  and  the  head  of  the 
sect  in  Jerusalem,  un  demi-fou  (I  186). 

This  phenomenon  of  two  aliens  in  one  family  of  seven 
children  Binet-Sangle  says  is  due  to  heredity.  Jesus’  heredit¬ 
ary  burden  probably  came  from  the  paternal  side  of  the  fam¬ 
ily,  for  his  father’s  precocious  death  seems  to  suggest  a  weak¬ 
ness  on  the  paternal  rather  than  on  the  maternal  side.  This 
hereditary  burden  was  due  to  alcoholism.  Jesus  was  born  and 
brought  up  in  a  land  and  family  that  consumed  a  great  deal 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


91 


of  strong  wines  and  where  the  alcoholic  habit  was  wide-spread 
and  deep-seated.  In  such  lands  and  families  psychic  degener¬ 
acy  is  specially  frequent.  The  incident  at  Cana  is  very  in¬ 
structive,  for  it  gives  a  clue  to  the  excessive  quantities  of  wine 
consumed  on  such  occasions.  A  family  in  which  mental  degen¬ 
eracy  is  so  advanced  soon  becomes  extinct;  it  is,  therefore, 
probable  that  the  family  of  Joseph  did  not  survive  beyond  the 
fourth  generation. 

Sa  Constitution  et  sa  Pliysiologie  (I  201-366) 

4  Though  the  canonical  Gospels  furnish  no  precise  informa¬ 
tion  concerning  the  physiological  constitution  of  Jesus,  yet 
Binet-Sangle  believes  that  certain  biographical  details  do  give 
some  approximate  indications.  Jesus  was  not  taller  than  the 
average  person,  for  Zachaeus  was  compelled  to  seek  a  vantage 
point  in  order  to  get  a  view  of  him.  His  entry  into  Jerusalem 
on  a  colt  of  an  ass  (Me  11,7)  shows  that  he  could  not  have  been 
either  tall  or  heavy  in  weight.  That  Jesus  did  not  differ  much 
in  appearance  from  his  companions  is  clear  from  the  fact  that 
Judas  must  identity  him  with  a  kiss.  (These  remarks  are  char¬ 
acteristic  of  the  profundity  of  most  of  Binet-Sangle’s  criti¬ 
cisms).  Jesus  cannot  have  been  robust,  but  was  rather  delicate 
of  constitution.  Mental  degeneracy  most  frequently  corre¬ 
sponds  to  physical  degeneracy.  The  alien’s  constitution  is 
mediocre  or  bad;  he  appears  younger  than  his  age;  he  mani¬ 
fests  elements  of  infantilism,  juvenility  or  feminism.  Child, 
adolescent  or  woman  in  mind,  he  is  the  same  in  body  (I  210). 

The  change  in  Jesus’  countenance  at  the  transfiguration 
was  an  attack  of  ecstasy.  This  experience  was  but  a  variety 
of  cataleptic  attack,  a  vesanic  syndrome.  As  the  majority  of 
ecstatics,  who  usually  have  a  vague  consciousness  of  the  patho¬ 
logical  nature  of  their  attacks,  Jesus  demanded  secrecy  of  the 
three  witnesses.  (Here  Binet-Sangle  strikes  upon  one  of  Ras¬ 
mussen’s  chief  points).  The  author  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  re¬ 
spected  this  request  of  his  master  and  omits  all  mention  of  the 
transfiguration  (Compare  Wrede,  CTJE,  S.  56  on  Jn  12,28ff). 
Peter  was  less  discreet  and  makes  mention  of  this  extraordin¬ 
ary  spectacle  in  one  of  his  letters  (II  Peter  1,17-18). 


92 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Binet-S angle  even  finds  materials  in  the  Gospels  which 
make  possible  an  approximate  analysis  of  the  condition  of 
Jesus’  digestive,  vasomotoric,  respiratory  and  genital  organs. 
That  Jesus  was  voracious  and,  as  many  paranoiacs,  abused  his 
stomach  is  clear  from  Mt  11,19  (Lc  7,33).  The  same  pas¬ 
sages  show  that  Jesus,  predisposed  by  hereditary  alcoholic  in¬ 
clination,  was  an  oenophilist.  Wine  figures  prominently  in  his 
teaching  (Me  2,22;  14,23f ;  Lc  5,39).  The  scene  at  Cana  is 
specially  instructive  concerning  Jesus’  alcoholic  habit  (Jn  2, 
Iff).  His  mother,  having  learned  by  experience  that  this  drink 
multiplied  Jesus’  deliriant  attacks,  said,  They  have  no  wine ,  in 
order  to  distract  her  son,  but  his  irritated  reply,  Woman,  what 
have  I  to  do  with  thee?,  forced  her  to  concede  in  order  to  avoid 
a  scene. 

Sitiophobia  is  a  further  pathological  trait  in  the  personal 
habits  of  Jesus  (Mt  6,16ff ;  17,21;  Me  9,29).  It  is  to  sitio¬ 
phobia  that  we  are  to  ascribe  the  forty  days  fasting  in  the  wild¬ 
erness.  This  experience  of  Jesus  corresponds  exactly  to  the 
typical  clinical  cases,  for  this  long  period  of  fasting  aggra¬ 
vated  his  delirium  and  gave  rise  to  hallucinations  which  clinical 
psychiatry  confirms  as  usually  demonomaniac  in  character  and 
content.  Jesus’  words  in  Jn  4,31ff  and  their  impression  on 
the  disciples  is  the  impression  which  certain  aliens  make  on  the 
crowd  (I  246). 

Jesus’  agony  in  Gethsemane  is  of  greatest  importance  in 
the  diagnosis  of  his  vesania.  Jesus’  emotions  on  this  occasion 
are  morbid.  It  is  a  vasomotoric  attack  accompanied  by  facial 
hematidrosis  (Lc  22,44)  wThich  appears  only  in  cases  of  mental 
malady,  neuropathology  and  hysteria.  This  attack  was 
brought  on  by  exposure  to  the  chill  of  the  early  spring  night 
and  prostration  on  the  damp  ground.  The  state  of  affairs  with 
the  Jerusalem  authorities  contributed  to  the  favorableness  of 
the  conditions  for  such  an  attack  by  the  emotional  upheaval  in 
which  Jesus  found  himself.  As  is  often  the  case,  this  attack 
was  attended  by  visual  hallucinations  (Lc  22,43).  Nothing 
further  is  required  for  declaring  that  the  founder  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  religion  was  a  psychic  degenerate  (I  288). 

The  pathological  condition  of  Jesus’  respiratory  system 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


93 


is  evident  from  his  inability  to  carry  the  cross  to  the  place  of 
execution.  I  am  sure  that  the  theomaniac  was  fatigued ;  I  am 
sure  that  he  had  not  slept  the  night  before  (I  290).  If  he  had 
been  strong  and  robust  as  were  his  two  fellow  victims,  he  would 
have  been  able  to  carry  the  cross  the  few  hundred  meters  dis¬ 
tance.  But  this  natural  feebleness  was  complicated  with  a 
graver  malady.  Jesus’  loud  cry  on  the  cross  proves  that  he 
did  not  die  of  exhaustion.  The  surprising  rapidity  with  which 
death  overtook  Jesus  on  the  cross  has  its  special  reason  which 
the  spear-thrust  and  the  issue  of  blood  and  water  make  clear, 
and  for  which  we  are  specially  indebted  to  the  author  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  (Jn  19,31).  The  issue  of  water  and  blood  is  a 
serofibrinous  effusion  due  to  pleurisy  which  Jesus  had  acquired. 
Legue  says  that  this  is  certainly  the  first  example  of  thoracen¬ 
tesis.  Jesus  was  afflicted  with  pleuritic  tuberculosis  which  is  a 
disease  often  concomitant  with  religious  paranoia.  Jesus’  habit 
of  nocturnal  retreats  to  solitude  with  frequent  exposure  to  the 
damp  and  chill  of  the  night  air  was  the  chief  contributing 
cause  to  this  pleuritic  tubercular  complication. 

Mental  degeneracy  is  often  accompanied  by  an  arrest¬ 
ment  of  the  genital  system.  Jesus’  attitude  toward  women, 
his  exaltation  of  sterility  (Lc  23,29)  and  eunuchism,  his  gen¬ 
eral  attitude  toward  the  institutions  of  the  family  and  mar¬ 
riage,  and  his  supersexual  conception  of  the  kingdom  of  God 
(Me  12,25)  confirm  this  in  his  case.  His  recommendation  of 
automutilation,  the  enucleation  of  the  eye  and  the  ablation  of 
the  hand,  seems  to  be  directed  against  sexual  perversion,  a  com¬ 
mon  phenomenon  among  psychopaths. 

Ses  Connaissances  et  ses  Idees  (II  3-167) 

Jesus  was  profoundly  ignorant  of  Aryan  science.  The 
exploration  of  the  brain  of  the  son  of  Elohim  from  this  point 
of  view  ends  with  lamentable  results ;  his  scientific  conceptions 
reduce  themselves  to  a  few  errors  (II  9).  Jesus  shared  the  Old 
Testament  supernaturalistic  view  of  the  world  and  life,  and 
with  it  its  scientific  ignorance.  From  the  angle  of  religious 
erudition  Jesus  fares  better:  his  brain,  poor  in  learning,  is  rich 
in  beliefs  and  religious  conceptions  drawn  from  the  Bible  and 
other  lucubrations  of  mystic  Jew's  (II  21).  Gifted  with  a  good 


94 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


memory,  as  are  most  of  his  race,  Jesus’  arduous  reading  of  his 
people’s  scriptures  resulted  in  his  retaining  a  great  number 
of  passages,  particularly  those  which  nourished  his  reveries  and 
deliriant  dreams.  His  ideas  of  God,  the  Holy  Spirit,  angels, 
demons,  sheol,  the  resurrection  and  the  last  judgment  Jesus 
borrowed  from  the  Old  Testament  and  Jewish  tradition,  both 
of  which  were  saturated  with  the  religious  myths  and  beliefs  of 
the  peoples  of  the  Near  and  Far  East.  Le  lecteur  n’a  pas  ete 
sans  remarquer  ce  quil  y  a  de  sombre  dans  ces  elucubrations 
(II  124),  but  all  of  these  ideas  simply  aggravated  Jesus’  vesa- 
nia  for  he  believed  that  all  of  these  traditional  teachings  cen¬ 
tered  upon  himself.  Jesus  thus  came  to  stipulate  exclusively 
egocentric  conditions  for  entrance  into  and  participation  in  the 
kingdom  of  God;  faith  in  Jesus  is  such  an  essential  condition 
for  entering  into  the  kingdom  that  good  and  bad  are  admitted 
without  distinction ,  if  they  have  only  believed  and  followed  him 
(II  158). 

Son  Delire  (II  169-327) 

By  son  delire  Binet-Sangle  means  the  problem  of  Jesus’ 
self-consciousness.  Jesus’  self-consciousness  corresponds  close¬ 
ly  to  the  historical  and  clinical  type  which  is  designated  as 
theomegalomania.  Megalomania  is  a  psychic  affection  charac¬ 
terized  by  a  pride  out  of  all  proportion  to  the  social  worth  of 
the  subject ;  I  mean  by  theomegalomania  a  psychic  affection 
where  this  excessive  pride  is  combined  with  an  extreme  piety 
(II  219). 

How  did  Jesus  come  to  identif}^  himself  with  the  Messiah 
of  the  Old  Testament?  Binet-Sangle  replies,  By  a  purely  path¬ 
ological  process.  The  first  step  in  this  process  is  furnished  by 
Lc  alone  (2,41ff).  This  early  incident  in  the  temple  at  Jeru¬ 
salem  marks  a  hebephrenic  crisis  which  usually  appears  in 
youthful  psychopaths  of  this  type,  and  is  due  to  puberal  auto¬ 
intoxication.  Jesus’  remarkable  discussions  with  the  teachers 
and  his  rude  reply  to  his  anxious  parents  are  simply  a  fit  of 
intellectual  excitation  and  an  exaggeration  of  self-conscious¬ 
ness  resting  on  a  purely  pathological  physiologic  state.  Out¬ 
side  circumstances  also  made  their  contribution  to  Jesus’  case 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


95 


of  theomegalomania.  The  consciousness  of  this  psychosis  is 
usually  very  sensitive  to  predictions,  particularly  those  of  a 
prophetic  type.  The  prophetic  preaching  of  the  Baptist  was 
a  prime  stimulus  to  Jesus’  delirium.  John  himself  appears  as 
a  member  of  the  great  family  of  asthenic  and  melancholic  de¬ 
generates.  He  was  a  victim  of  the  Messianic  suggestions  of 
the  epoch  and  an  alien  who  made  a  great  impression  upon  the 
general  public.  His  message  confirmed  Jesus  in  his  delirium. 
Jesus  and  John,  for  a  time  at  least,  as  Elijah  and  Elisha,  as 
Jesus  and  his  brother  James,  constituted  a  psychopathic  pair. 
John  ic cis  the  spiritual  father  of  Jesus  whose  servile  imitations 
attest,  in  default  of  other  proofs,  an  intellectual  infirmity  (II 
255).  On  Lc  3,23  Binet-Sangle  comments:  This  precious  bit 
of  information,  furnished  by  the  gospel  according  to  Luke,  ac¬ 
cords  with  the  data  of  psychopathology,  for  the  psychiatrist 
sees  here  the  vesania  of  Jesus  entering  upon  its  active  phase 
which  usually  comes  about  the  thirtieth  year. 

But  the  one  element  that  seems  to  have  convinced  Jesus  of 
his  Messiahship  more  than  any  other  was  the  cures  he  effected. 
They  played  an  etiological  role  in  the  delirium  of  the  Nazarene 
through  the  influence  of  auto-suggestion.  The  sick  that  were 
cured  made  their  contribution  by  direct  suggestions  regarding 
his  identity.  The  realization  of  his  ability  to  divine  the 
thoughts  of  both  friends  and  foes  still  further  added  material 
to  the  fire  that  burned  within  Jesus’  soul.  Jesus  was  further 
strengthened  in  his  vesania  by  the  fact  that  he  could  win  and 
retain  disciples  whose  confessions  corroborated  the  contents  of 
his  own  consciousness. 

Binet-Sangle  distinguishes  three  stages  in  the  development 
of  Jesus’  theomegalomania.  1)  L'erreur  fixe  primor diale  of 
Jesus  was  the  conviction  that  he  was  the  Messiah,  king,  son, 
confidant,  sole  agent,  and  interpreter  of  Jahweh.  2)  La  trans¬ 
formation  de  la  personalite.  This  transformation  seems  to 
have  been  well  under  way  in  Jesus’  case  when  he  was  twelve 
years  of  age.  At  the  age  of  twelve  perhaps,  his  personality  n°l 
( son  of  the  village  carpenter)  gave  place  to  a  personality  n°2 
( Messiah ,  Son  of  God)  (II  284).  It  was  completed  when  Jesus 
said,  I  and  the  Father  am  one.  3)  La  systematisation  du  delire 


96 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


appeared  in  Jesus’  case  when  he  begins  to  speak  of  his  resur¬ 
rection  and  cosmic  triumph  as  supreme  judge  of  human  fate 
and  the  sole  expiation  for  sin.  Each  stage  is  definite  and  dis¬ 
tinct,  and  each  marks  an  aggravation  of  Jesus’  vesania.  On 
page  307  of  volume  two  Binet-Sangle  assures  us,  there  is  not 
in  the  history  of  science  a  case  of  theomeg atomaniac  delirium 
that  manifests  itself  in  a  more  evident  fashion. 

Ses  Hallucinations  (II  329-394) 

The  hallucination  is  a  sensation  without  a  real  object  in 
the  outside  world,  a  sensation  central  in  its  origin.  Three 
periods  are  to  be  distinguished  in  religious  paranoia:  1)  the 
period  of  conception  and  systematization  2)  the  hallucinatory 
period;  3)  the  period  of  the  transformation  of  the  personality. 
Jesus ,  the  son  of  Joseph ,  does  not  escape  this  law  of  pathology 
(II  345).  It  is  probable  that  the  theomegalomaniac  of  Naza¬ 
reth  had  had  hallucinations  prior  to  those  recorded  by  the 
evangelists.  His  word  to  his  parents  (Lc  2,49)  betrays  a  con¬ 
sciousness  w’on  wdthout  doubt  by  hallucination.  The  evangel¬ 
ists  actually  report  seven  hallucinations  of  Jesus.  The  first 
is  at  the  Jordan;  it  is  visual  and  audative  in  character.  The 
temptation,  the  post-Johannic  crisis  (II  355),  wdth  its  scene 
and  circumstances,  furnished  the  most  favorable  subjective  and 
objective  conditions  for  hallucinations:  the  solitude  and  silence 
so  favorable  to  meditation,  contemplation,  reveries,  concentra¬ 
tion  of  the  attention  on  a  fixed  object  of  thought,  and  the  rum¬ 
ination  of  certain  fixed  ideas,  the  monotony  of  the  desert,  the 
heat,  the  fatigue  and  hunger  prepared  a  very  fertile  soil  for 
numerous  and  various  hallucinations.  Four  hallucinations  fol- 
lovr  one  upon  the  other  in  rapid  succession.  The  first  w^as  an 
hallucination  of  abstinence  and  nurture  brought  on  by  long 
fasting  and  was  attended  by  visual  and  audative-verbal  demon¬ 
omaniac  appearances  so  frequent  in  clinical  religious  paranoia. 
The  second  and  third  hallucinations  in  the  desert  were  pano¬ 
ramic  and  “aeroplanic,”  and  not  less  classical  in  clinical  psy¬ 
chiatry.  The  fourth  hallucination,  the  appearance  of  the 
angels  and  the  wild  beasts,  is  common  to  mystics  and  arose  from 
successive  emotional  reverses  between  comfort  and  fear.  These 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


97 


four  hallucinations  in  the  desert  constitute  a  psychic  syndrome 
known  as  le  ragle.  Plus  que  tout  autre,  Ieschou  devait  etre  at- 
teint  de  ragle  au  desert  (II  381). 

Lc  10,18  is  Jesus’  sixth  hallucination;  it  is  haute  and  lum¬ 
inous  in  character,  and  with  Jesus  seems  to  have  had  a  relig¬ 
ions  geschichtlichen  origin  based  upon  the  Assyrian  legend  and 
the  book  of  Enoch.  The  last  specific  hallucination  is  also  re¬ 
ported  by  Lc  alone  in  22,43,  the  appearance  of  the  angel  in 
Gethsemane.  To  the  kinesthetic  verbal  hallucinations  of  Jesus 
Binet-Sangle  reckons  the  transfiguration  and  certain  Johan- 
nine  words  in  which  Jesus  disclaims  his  words  as  his  own  and 
ascribes  them  to  the  Father  who  speaks  directly  through  him 
(verbal  automatism). 

From  the  point  of  view  of  hallucinations  the  life  of  Jesus 
is  to  be  divided  into  two  distinct  periods :  the  first  in  which  the 
hallucinations  are  frequent  and  follow  rapidly  one  upon  the 
other  (the  first  five  belong  to  this  period)  ;  the  second  which 
includes  the  remainder  of  Jesus’  life,  but  during  which  only  two 
specific  hallucinations  are  reported,  and  by  Lc  alone  (10,18; 
22,43). 

The  hallucinations  of  Jesus,  such  as  they  are  reported  to 
us  by  the  evangelists,  permit  us  to  conclude  that  the  founder 
of  the  Christian  religion  was  a  victim  of  religious  paranoia. 
Such  hallucinations  aggravate  the  delirium  of  the  paranoiac, 
exercise  a  strong  reaction  on  his  spirit,  and  confirm  the  un¬ 
fortunate  soul  in  his  errors  and  delusions.  The  hallucination 
at  the  Jordan  marks  the  entry  of  Jesus,  son  of  Joseph,  into 
the  ranks  of  the  incurables.  Henceforth  nothing  is  able  to  re¬ 
strain  him  in  the  expression  of  his  delirium,  neither  the  injuries 
of  the  priests  and  the  soldiers  nor  the  majesty  of  the  Sanhedrin 
and  the  Praetorium,  not  even  the  suffering  of  the  cross 
(II  394)  (1). 

Ses  Facultes  intellect uelles  (III  11-153) 

Jesus’  faculty  of  memory  was  abnormally  developed  and 
fits  the  state  designated  as  hypermnesia.  His  memory  special- 

(1)  Part  A’  of  volume  II,  385-510,  Binet-Sangle  devotes  to  citing  sixty- 
one  instances  of  megalomania  and  theomegalomania  from  the  time  of 
Jesus’  death  down  to  the  present. 


98 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


ized  particularly  on  rural  and  mystic  objects.  On  the  least  oc¬ 
casion  passages  from  the  Old  Testament  were  pertinently 
placed  in  his  addresses  and  contentions.  The  normal  subject 
forms  most  of  his  associations  upon  the  meaning  of  words; 
purely  verbal  associations  are  extremely  rare.  In  the  case  of 
Jesus  these  verbal  associations  are  very  frequent;  he  seemed 
fond  of  a  play  on  words.  (Binet-Sangle  cites  seven  instances 
of  this  type  of  association:  Mt  4,3f ;  4,9ff ;  16,18;  Lc  9,60; 
Me  1,17;  Jn  3,3ff). 

Jesus  had  also  acquired  the  psychopathic  habit  of  ego- 
echolalia,  of  which  Binet-Sangle  cites  fifteen  instances  ( Verily , 
verily;  Blessed;  Ye  have  heard  it  said  of  old;  Woe  unto  you; 
etc.)  These  instances  in  the  form  of  Jesus’  address  are  of  real 
value  from  the  clinical  point  of  view,  for  they  show  that  Jesus 
had  entered  in  upon  the  third  stage  of  religious  paranoia ;  be¬ 
sides,  they  resemble  closely  the  characteristic  type  of  address 
of  theomegalomaniacs.  Jesus’  language  is  often  incoherent; 
he  expresses  himself  in  abrupt  sentences  without  endeavoring 
to  bind  them  together  in  thought  (Binet-Sangle  finds  six  such 
instances).  Jesus’  thought  itself  is  often  incoherent  (five  in¬ 
stances),  and  particularly  toward  the  close  of  his  life  where 
his  reasoning  powers  seem  to  have  weakened. 

A  further  sign  of  intellectual  inferiority  is  Jesus’  incli¬ 
nation  to  allow  his  thought  to  revel  in  a  dream  world  rather 
than  in  the  real  world.  He  was  interested  in  the  real  world  of 
men  and  tilings  only  in  so  far  as  it  furnished  him  parable  and 
metaphor  for  the  illustration  of  the  facts  and  processes  in  his 
imaginary  scheme.  These  images  turned  about  his  primordial 
delusion  (III  103).  His  imaginative  creations,  the  parables, 
are  vague,  inconsistent  and  without  color ;  the  person  who  com¬ 
posed  them  was  neither  an  observer  nor  a  thinker.  This  feeble¬ 
ness  of  Jesus’  creative  imagination  accords,  on  the  one  hand, 
with  the  simplicity  of  his  hallucinations ;  on  the  other  hand, 
with  his  attitude  toward  his  critics.  A  man  of  vivid  imagina¬ 
tion,  in  evoking  the  suffering  that  awaited  him,  would  have 
chosen  other  words  (III  103)  (1).  It  is  very  doubtful 

(1)  When  Binet-Sangle  finds  the  parables  of  Jesus  inferior  to  those 
of  the  Indian  Scriptures  he  reminds  us  of  the  position  of  Yon  Hartmann. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


99 


if  Jesus  composed  all  the  parables  found  in  the  Gospels; 
those  that  we  can  with  certainty  ascribe  to  him  are  the  products 
of  an  ignorant  and  debilitated  mind  and  are  uninteresting  from 
the  literary  point  of  view.  They  simply  illustrate  his  delirium 
and  are  all  inspired  by  his  vesanic  passion.  Most  of  them  fall 
within  the  earlier  period  of  his  career  and  would  suggest  a  de¬ 
cline,  or  even  a  loss,  of  his  mnesie  and  imaginative  faculties 
during  his  Jerusalem  days.  The  Fourth  Gospel,  the  biography 
of  the  decline,  contains  no  parables.  As  weak  as  it  was  Jesus’ 
imagination  was  his  predominant  intellectual  possession.  It 
probably  explains  his  taste  for  retreat  to  solitude  where  in  the 
silence  of  the  night  and  the  mountains  he  loved  to  build  up  his 
illusory  kingdom,  and  where  in  the  intimacy  of  his  own  con¬ 
sciousness  he  played  the  role  of  king  and  God  and  surrendered 
himself  to  the  contemplation  of  his  work  and  self-adoration. 

In  the  words  of  Jesus  there  does  not  exist  a  single  exam¬ 
ple  of  correct  reasoning.  His  argumentation  is  weak  and  its 
method  is  Talmudic.  Its  theme  and  point  is  his  own  delirium. 
In  seven  out  of  nine  instances  he  goes  out  from  false  premises ; 
his  discourses  contain  but  three  complete  syllogisms.  His  rea¬ 
soning  is  by  enthymeme  in  which  one  proposition  of  the  syllog¬ 
ism  is  omitted,  the  usual  logic  of  aliens.  The  purpose  of  his 
logic  is  to  convince,  and  not  to  attain  to  the  truth.  As  is  usual 
with  paranoiacs,  Jesus’  mind  worked  by  stops  and  starts,  by 
a  kind  of  intellectual  spasms  or  fits.  The  first  instance  of  this 
that  has  come  down  to  us  is  the  incident  of  the  twelve  year  old 
boy  discussing  and  disputing  with  the  doctors  in  the  temple. 
The  frequency  of  these  spasms  was  augmented  during  his 
Jerusalem  days.  It  is  during  these  acces  intellec  fuels  that 
Jesus  narrated  his  parables  and  preached  the  kingdom  of  God 
in  such  terms  and  manner  as  filled  his  hearers  with  astonishment 
and  admiration.  There  is  nothing  in  the  Gospels  to  explain 
this  popular  admiration ;  it  must  have  been  in  the  emotions  that 
Jesus  manifested  in  his  public  address  and  which  do  not  regis¬ 
ter  themselves  with  pen  on  paper.  Mt.  6,25-29  is  about  the 
only  passage  in  the  Gospels  of  any  literary  value  or  import¬ 
ance.  It  was  less  what  Jesus  said  that  captivated  the  multi¬ 
tudes,  more  the  manner  in  which  he  . said  it.  It  was  the  fire  of 


100 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


his  look,  the  tension  of  his  features,  the  arrogance  of  his  atti¬ 
tude  and  hearing,  the  vehemence  of  his  manner,  the  inflections 
of  his  voice,  the  conviction  that  emanated  from  his  whole  being, 
a  total  eloquence,  of  which  there  remains  nothing  for  us  be¬ 
cause  it  was  purely  sentimental  and  temperamental  (III  150). 
From  the  intellectual  point  of  view  Jesus  was  an  inferior  mind 
and  manifested  many  traits  in  common  with  aliens. 

Ses  Sentiments  (III  152-318) 

Jesus  was  an  emotional  and  passionate  individual,  abnor¬ 
mally  temperamental.  We  shall  see  in  him,  following  one  upon 
the  other  without  cessation ,  attacks  of  joy,  sadness,  fear,  love, 
anger,  eruptions  diversely  colored  and  emanating  from  the  same 
volcano ,  from  the  same  furnace,  from  the  same  central  fire  that 
had  consumed  him  from  youth  :  admiration,  love  and  passion  for 
self,  inextinguishable  pride  (III  167). 

The  experience  of  joy  was  rare  for  Jesus.  The  Gospels 
record  not  more  than  four  hedonic  experiences:  the  voice  at  the 
Jordan,  the  confession  at  Caesarea  Philippi,  the  remonstrance 
of  the  centurion  against  Jesus  coming  under  his  unworthy  roof, 
and  Jesus  acclamation  (Lc  10,21ff — Mt  ll,25ff).  All  these 
bore  directly  upon  his  delirium  and  added  fire  to  his  vesanic 
passion.  These  egocentric  joys  show  how  the  psychic  life  of 
the  theomegalomaniac  was  strongly  systematized,  how  its  va¬ 
rious  wheelworks  were  closely  geared.  The  whole  system  re¬ 
volves  around  the  same  fixed  idea,  everything  rests  upon  the 
adamant  of  pride  (III  172). 

Jesus  did  not  escape  the  psychopathic  law  of  temperamen¬ 
tal  depressions.  He  was  subject  to  longer  and  shorter  attacks 
of  melancholy  which  were  often  attended  by  demonomania. 
They  are  regularly  scattered  throughout  his  public  career  be¬ 
ginning  with  the  temptation  and  ending  with  the  desolate  cry 
on  the  cross  (Binet-Sangle  cites  nine  such  instances  of  depres¬ 
sion).  Jesus’  depression  and  melancholy  is  pathological  in  that 
it  was  in  no  way  able  to  alter  his  fixed  idea. 

Fear  was  a  prominent  determining  factor  in  the  life  of 
Jesus.  It  forces  him  to  flee  beyond  the  borders  of  Galilee,  re- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


101 


sort  to  retreats,  to  travel  and  work  incognito.  Jesus  often 
confesses  his  fear;  Jn  12,27  is  a  precious  notice  for  the  psy¬ 
chopathologist.  His  fears  would  have  caused  him  to  lead  an 
obscure  life,  but  the  aggravation  of  his  vesania  would  not  per¬ 
mit  him.  He  must  materialize  his  dream ;  but  it  was  with  ex¬ 
treme  prudence  that  he  undertook  its  realization  (III  197). 
This  caution  is  seen  clearly  by  his  commands  for  silence  to  those 
whom  he  had  cured.  He  never  confessed  his  identity  even  to 
the  most  intimate  disciples  until  the  close  of  his  Galilean  min¬ 
istry.  His  employment  of  circumlocutions  in  referring  to  him¬ 
self  is  a  precaution  motived  by  fear.  Thus,  in  designating  him¬ 
self  as  the  Son  of  man,  the  theomegalomaniac  fully  satisfied  his 
own  pride  and  abandoned  himself  completely  to  his  vesania  with¬ 
out  risk ;  he  made  himself  understood  to  his  confidants  and  left 
his  adversaries  in  uncertainty  (III  205).  The  employment  of 
this  singular  expression,  Son  of  man,  which  neither  Jesus  nor 
his  disciples  ever  explain  and  which  does  not  occur  in  the  nar¬ 
rative  portions  of  the  Gospels,  concords  completely  with  the 
observations  of  clinical  psychiatry.  In  fact  chronic  aliens 
often  condense  in  a  word,  which  they  forge  with  the  aid  of  ele¬ 
ments  borrowed  from  ordinary  language,  or  in  an  expression, 
the  sense  of  which  they  pervert,  the  essential  and  characteristic 
element  of  their  delirium  (III  206).  Jesus’  parables  are  simply 
a  veil  which  he  elusively  drapes  about  his  identity  and  inten¬ 
tions. 

When  questions  concerning  his  identity  became  too  direct 
and  pointed,  he  either  remained  silent  or  gave  an  ambiguous 
reply.  As  is  frequent  with  megalomaniacs,  Jesus  dissimulated 
his  delirium,  but  as  he  came  to  lose  his  sense  for  the  real  world 
of  social  relations  and  his  dementia  grew  this  dissimulation  was 
less  indirect.  What  a  difference  between  the  imaginative  enig¬ 
matic  addresses  at  the  beginning  of  his  career  and  the  rash  dis¬ 
courses  during  his  last  sojourn  in  Jerusalem  (III  22Jf). 

Jesus’  fear  turns  his  ministry  into  one  eternal  hegira,  a 
series  of  escapes  and  flights.  In  spite  of  the  peril  which  lurked 
for  him  in  Jerusalem  he  could  not  distance  himself  from  it. 
The  holy  city  had  an  invincible  fascination  for  him,  but  in  this 
grave  period  of  his  vesania  with  the  fading  away  of  his  dis- 


102 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


criminative  faculties  it  was  to  be  the  beacon-light  against 
which  he  was  to  suffer  shipwreck. 

Jesus’  affections  were  pathological.  Two  emotions  dom¬ 
inated  all  others,  his  love  for  himself  ( V amour  propre)  and  his 
love  for  those  who  believed  in  him.  His  affection  for  children 
was  equally  egocentric  in  character.  He  loved  the  docile,  the 
obliging,  and  those  who  showed  affection  for  him.  This  auto- 
philism  is  the  predominant  affection  of  megalomaniacs,  but  it 
is  not  their  only  affection.  At  certain  times  they  are  capable 
of  altruism,  but  this  affectivity  follows  the  fluctuations  of  their 
delirium.  It  is  in  Jesus’  occasional  manifestations  of  pity  for 
the  oppressed  and  the  social  outcasts  that  we  find  the  thing  that 
has  contributed  more  than  anything  else  to  the  success  of  Chris¬ 
tianity.  But  even  the  most  selfish  egoist  is  now  and  then  cap¬ 
able  of  a  touching  altruistic  word  or  deed. 

Sexually  Jesus’  affections  were  inverted,  if  not  perverted. 
This  is  characteristic  of  psychopaths.  On  the  parable  of  the 
prodigal  son  Binet-Sangle  comments,  it  seems  that  Jesus,  son  of 
Joseph,  conceals  within  this  parable  some  incident  of  his  senti¬ 
mental  life  (III  287)  ;  it  tells  the  story  of  the  flight  of  a  be¬ 
loved  disciple,  his  repentant  return,  and  the  great  scandal  cre¬ 
ated  by  another  jealous  disciple.  It  was  jealous}7,  so  frequent 
among  homosexuals,  that  provoked  the  betrayal  of  Judas.  Le 
suicide  de  Vhomme  de  Keriotli  etait  un  suicide  par  amour  (ni 
293). 

Jesus’  admirers  loved  to  portray  him  as  a  God  of  love,  but 
he  was  possessed  with  a  violent  hatred  that  was  anything  but 
sane.  Blinded  by  his  vanity,  convinced  that  the  world  would  be 
effaced  before  him,  the  theome galomaniac  was  constantly  wound¬ 
ed,  offended  and  humiliated  by  those  with  whom  he  came  in  con¬ 
tact  (III  300).  Jesus’  impatience,  his  rude  replies,  threats, 
woes,  and  violence  furnish  abundant  evidence  of  the  irritated 
state  of  his  mind.  His  kindness  toward  others  was  limited  to 
the  earlier  part  of  his  career  and  made  only  occasional  fitful 
appearances  toward  the  end  of  his  life.  He  vented  his  wrath 
against  innocent  objects  (the  sea  and  the  fig  tree),  even  against 
his  disciples  when  they  were  specially  dull  or  would  turn  him 
from  his  perilous  path.  His  rebuke  to  Peter  (Me  8,33)  is  in- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


103 


comprehensible  from  a  man  of  sound  mind ,  but  this  anger  is 
admirably  accounted  for  in  a  theomegalomaniac  (III  307).  He 
shared  the  usual  zenophobia  of  his  race  and  turned  to  the  Gen¬ 
tiles  only  when  such  a  turn  served  the  ends  of  his  delirium  be- 
cause  he  had  been  unsuccessful  with  his  own  people.  His  hatred 
was  uncompromising  toward  rival  prophets  (Mt  7,15ff)  and 
the  incredulous  for  whom,  as  have  paranoiacs  of  all  times,  he 
depicted  disaster.  Jesus  knew  only  hatred  for  the  family  and 
its  ties;  this  perversion  of  affective  sentiment  Jesus ,  son  of 
Joseph,  desired  to  instill  in  his  disciples,  all  for  the  satisfaction 
it  would  afford  his  pride,  Lc  14,26  (III  333).  Jesus'  animos¬ 
ity  against  wealth  and  the  wealthy  was  only  a  reaction  of  his 
pride ;  the  parable  of  the  great  supper  is  only  a  reflection  of 
his  failure  to  win  them  and  a  veil  for  his  rancour. 

Son  Proces  (III  349-528) 

The  accounts  of  Jesus’  trial  Binet-Sangle  finds  of  capital 
importance  both  from  the  historical  and  the  psychological  point 
of  view.  Historically  the  Gospel  records  of  Jesus  trial  are  con¬ 
firmed  by  the  Talmudists  in  their  outlines  of  Jewish  legal  pro¬ 
cedure.  From  the  point  of  view  of  the  alienist  the  account  of 
Jesus’  trial  is  interesting  and  instructive,  for  Jesus’  attitude 
toward  his  judges  is  that  commonly  observed  among  paranoi¬ 
acs.  The  judges  of  Jesus  committed  the  judicial  error  which 
has  become  classic  in  the  treatment  of  such  aliens.  At  the  time 
of  his  trial  Jesus’  personality  was  completely  transformed  in 
accordance  with  his  delirium  and  he  identified  himself  with  the 
God  of  the  Jews.  His  confession  of  his  identity  before  the 
Jerusalem  authorities  definitely  consigns  Jesus  to  the  dissim¬ 
ulating  group  of  paranoiacs,  who  under  the  impulse  of  a  mo¬ 
mentary  passion  divulge  their  long  guarded  secret.  Jesus’ 
silence  before  his  judges  is  nothing  other  than  a  paranoiac  stu¬ 
por  from  which  the  high  priest  could  evoke  him  to  answer  only 
by  adjuration  (Mt  26,63).  Pilate  was  a  poor  psychologist, 
for  he  did  not  discern  the  nature  of  the  case  before  him,  unless 
his  words,  Behold  the  man,  can  be  understood  as  his  plea  for 
Jesus’  life  in  view  of  his  demented  condition.  Jesus’  condem¬ 
nation  to  death  by  the  Jewish  and  Roman  authorities  is  the  sym- 


104 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


bol  of  the  lamentable  judicial  error  that  civil  authority  has  al¬ 
ways  been  guilty  of  in  its  treatment  of  aliens  to  whom  it  has 
meted  out  so-called  justice.  The  centurion’s  confession  at  the 
cross  (Lc  23,47)  can  serve  as  the  conclusion  to  the  history  of 
this  legal  mistake. 

Sa  Morale  (IV  1-57) 

The  majority  of  Jesus’  moral  precepts  were  inspired  by 
his  vesanic  pride  ( Sa  morale  nest  que  V  expression  de  sa  vesanie; 
IV  12).  His  deification  of  his  own  ego  does  not  deserve  the 
name  of  morals.  The  one  precept  that  dominated  all  others 
was  the  duty  of  admiring  him.  To  secure  this,  he  taught  the 
duty  of  humility,  accord,  mendicity,  sobriety,  continence,  and 
subvention.  Other  moral  precepts  were  provoked  by  his  hatred 
for  the  Jewish  and  his  fear  of  the  Roman  authorities.  Duties 
toward  the  poor,  parents,  wife,  and  widow  may  have  rooted  in 
a  genuine  feeling  of  pity,  but  it  was  not  an  unselfish  pity. 
Jesus’  moral  teachings  that  are  worth  while  are  not  original 
with  him,  for  most  of  them  are  merely  reproductions  of  earlier 
Biblical  rules  of  conduct. 

What  one  usuallv  calls  the  morals  of  Jesus  are  only  an 
Asiatic  chrestomathy.  The  son  of  the  carpenter  of  Nazareth 
only  chose  in  keeping  with  his  temperament ,  character ,  feel¬ 
ings,  pride  and  the  demands  of  his  vesania  from  among  the 
ethical  precepts  which  were  current  in  his  land  and  time ,  above 
all  from  the  Bible  whence  he  drew  with  full  hands  (III  53).  Of 
the  sixty- three  different  precepts  which  Jesus  expressed  only 
eleven  are  original  with  him,  and  ten  of  these  eleven  center  up¬ 
on  himself.  Jesus  was  not  an  original  moralist;  in  fact,  he  was 
not  a  moralist  at  all.  He  did  not  possess  the  true  moral  sense, 
for  his  choice  is  never  determined  by  observation  and  reason, 
but  by  his  delirium  which  is  usual  with  aliens. 

Son  Activite  (IV  61-293) 

Jesus’  public  career  was  vagabond  and  only  one  long 
series  of  peregrinations.  As  is  frequent  with  paranoiacs  Jesus 
was  taken  with  ambulomania ;  this  explains  best  his  attitude  to¬ 
ward  labor,  possessions,  and  the  family,  all  of  which  require 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


105 


permanent  residence.  Jesus  entered  the  ranks  of  the  incurables 
when  he  began  his  itinerary  in  Galilee.  This  regular  restless¬ 
ness  was  often  interrupted  by  frequent  and  fitful  flights;  this 
is  merely  un  accident  dans  le  coin's  de  sa  vesanie  (IV  119).  His 
chronic  vagabondage  and  fits  of  flight  began  at  twelve  years 
when  he  escaped  the  attention  of  his  parents  and  was  found 
again  in  the  temple. 

In  his  reconstruction  of  Jesus’  public  career  and  its  chron¬ 
ology  Binet-Sangle  finds  eight  flights  and  retreats,  four  propa¬ 
ganda  campaigns  about  the  lake  of  Tiberias,  one  shift  in  the 
scene  of  his  ministry  from  Nazareth  to  Capernaum,  two  at¬ 
tempts  on  Galilean  cities,  and  five  attempts  on  Jerusalem.  Jesus 
was  driven  by  the  same  spirit,  let  Rouah  d’Elohim,  which  drove 
Elijah  and  Jonah.  Summary  notices  of  preaching  tours  in  the 
Gospels  evince  the  chronic  character  of  Jesus’  ambulatory  af¬ 
fliction.  The  oscillations  of  his  itinerary  between  Galilee  and 
Jerusalem  were  provoked  by  two  emotions,  fear  and  pride.  His 
Messianic  pride  drove  him  to  the  capital  in  the  south,  but  his 
morbid  fear  drove  him  north  again  to  Galilee,  son  pis-aller. 
He  is  the  feather  on  the  wind  of  his  delirium.  He  is  the  wreck 
on  the  tide  of  his  insanity.  He  is  the  stone  that  dislodged  the 
avalanche  of  his  thoughts  and  passions  (IV  183).  This  errant 
type  of  life  was  full  of  privations  and  prepared  the  way  for 
the  pleuritic  tuberculosis  which  caused  his  precocious  death  on 
the  cross. 

Among  the  vesanie  acts  of  Jesus  is  to  be  reckoned  his 
stilling  of  the  storm  during  which  he  had  fallen  into  a  morbid 
sleep.  His  writing  on  the  ground  (Jn  8,8)  is  a  deliriant  pre¬ 
occupation.  His  aggravated  mental  state  vented  itself  par¬ 
ticularly  during  the  passion  week,  during  which  Jesus  commits 
five  vesanie  acts:  1)  the  entry  into  Jerusalem,  la  manifestation 
la  plus  eclat  ante  de  sa  folie)  ;  2)  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree, 
(an  act  qui  est  telle  quil  ne  s'en  trouvera  pas  une  semblable 
dans  la  vie  d'ancun  homme  raisonable)  ;  3)  the  cleansing  of  the 
temple,  (de  tels  acces  ne  se  rencontrent  que  chez  les  alienes)  ; 
4)  the  washing  of  the  disciples’  feet,  (le  fetishisme  de  pied  est 
le  plus  commun  des  fetishisme s  chez  le  homosexuels )  ;  5)  the 


106 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


celebration  of  the  last  supper  where  his  words  are  comprehen¬ 
sible  only  in  view  of  his  delirium. 

The  curriculum  vitae  of  Jesus  is  identical  with  that  of 
other  theomegalomaniacs ;  this  type  of  insanity  first  appears 
in  the  form  of  fantastic  thoughts  and  ideas,  later  in  extrava¬ 
gant  words,  and  finally  breaks  forth  in  vesanic  acts. 

Jesus’  language  was  anomalous  in  character,  as  is  the  case 
with  aliens  who  usually  experience  difficulty  in  expressing  them¬ 
selves.  Medically  Jesus’  type  of  expression  is  to  be  designated 
as  logorrhea  (Me  4,2;  6,34).  Jesus’  need  of  expressing  his 
surging  thoughts  satisfied  itself  by  indulging  in  monologue,  at 
first  apart  in  private  prayer  but  later  in  public.  His  farewell 
address  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  one  thematic  paralogy:  it  is 
so  manifestly  deliriant  that  I  have  never  been  able  to  read  it 
without  ashing  myself  whether  I  am  the  first  alienist  to  open 
the  Gospels  (IV  244).  Jesus’  language  can  further  be  de¬ 
scribed  as  embolophasia  and  auto-echolalia.  He  abused  the 
personal  pronoun  “7”  and  loved  auto-designation  in  the  third 
person.  His  authorative  word  is  again  one  of  the  character¬ 
istics  of  the  psychosis  he  had  attained  (IV  253).  Jesus’  verbal 
explosions  were  provoked  by  his  pride,  joy,  fear,  sadness,  and 
hatred  (Binet-Sangle  lists  twenty-eight  such  explosions). 
Jesus’  silence  before  the  Sanhedrin  and  Pilate  was  an  attack 
of  mutism.  His  designation  of  his  words  as  not  his  own  but 
as  those  of  another  is  to  be  described  as  verbal  automatism. 
The  voice  at  the  transfiguration  emanait  du  larynz  de  Ieschou 
bar-Iossef  (IV  266).  In  reality  the  language  of  Jesus ,  son  of 
Joseph,  is  identically  that  of  theomegalomaniacs  in  our  present- 
day  asylums  (IV  239). 

Jesus  presents  anomalies  of  sleep.  Insomnia  is  habitual 
with  neuropaths  and  is  one  of  the  first  symptoms  of  insanity. 
That  Jesus  wTas  afflicted  with  insomnia  is  clear  from  the  frequent 
retreats  at  night  for  prayer.  His  sleep  during  the  storm  which 
he  stilled  is  paroxysmal  and  morbid. 

Diagnostic  de  sa  Folie  (IV  295-461) 

In  his  diagnosis  of  the  insanity  of  Jesus  Binet-Sangle  pro¬ 
ceeds  as  follows:  Jesus  was  a  Jew  (the  race  particularly  pre- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


107 


disposed  to  insanity),  a  bachelor,  a  degenerate,  an  alien,  a  par¬ 
anoiac,  a  megalomaniac,  a  theomegalomaniac,  an  hysterico- 
theomegalomaniac  (religious  paranoia). 

Binet-Sangle  concludes  his  work  with  the  remark:  I  have 
reached  the  end  of  the  task  which  I  set  for  myself  and  I  believe 
that  I  can  say  that  for  alienists,  medical  men,  for  all  learned 
and  sincere  persons,  the  insanity  of  the  founder  of  the  Chris¬ 
tian  religion  is  a  demonstrated  truth  (IV  162). 

Binet-Sangle’s  work  is  the  most  extensive  and  thorough¬ 
going  pathography  of  Jesus  that  has  appeared,  four  volumes 
with  a  total  of  1911  pages.  Its  very  voluminousness  speaks 
against  it.  Among  the  pathographers  of  Jesus  none  finds  Jesus 
so  thoroughly  demented  as  Binet-Sangle.  Hardly  an  incident 
or  word  in  the  Gospels  does  he  leave  unturned  toward  the  sup¬ 
port  of  his  contention.  No  pathographer  of  Jesus  is  more  un¬ 
critical  and  indiscriminate  in  his  use  of  the  sources.  The 
Fourth  Gospel  is  his  fortress.  One  would  judge  from  the  char¬ 
acter  of  his  conclusions  that  he  had  never  read  a  standard 
critical  work  on  the  Gospels. 

His  work  is  written  from  the  purely  medical  and  techni¬ 
cally  psychological  point  of  view,  and  is  chiefly  interesting  be¬ 
cause  of  his  electro-chemical  theory  of  psychic  phenomena.  He 
explains  psychic  pathology  by  1)  phenomenes  de  circuit  inter- 
rompu  and  2)  phenomenes  de  court-circuit  (III  Iff).  Binet- 
Sangle  sometimes  seems  more  interested  in  the  airing  of  his 
psychological  theories  than  in  the  subject  under  treatment. 
His  work  is  full  of  its  selon  moi.  His  collection  of  historical 
and  clinical  cases  of  mental  alienation  of  various  types  is  in¬ 
teresting  for  comparative  psychopathology,  but  medically  of 
no  special  value. 

For  the  student  of  the  life  of  Jesus  Binet-Sangle’s  four 
volumes  are  practically  worthless. 

4)  Jesus — A  Case  of  Nerves 

Julius  Baumann 

Baumann,  Professor  of  Philosophy  at  the  University  of 
Goettingen,  in  his  book,  Die  Gemuetsart  Jesu :  nach  jetziger 
wissenschaftlicher,  insbesondere  jetziger  psychologischer 


108 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Methode  erkennbar  gemaclit  (Leipzig,  1908,  80  S.),  deals 
only  incidentally  with  the  question  of  Jesus’  psychic  health.  He 
chooses  as  his  historico-critical  guide  the  New  Testament  work 
of  Wellhausen,  Bischoff  and  Dalman;  his  psychanalytic  posi¬ 
tion  he  bases  on  Werner’s  Der  religioese  W  ahnsinn  (1890). 
Baumann  is  far  from  analysing  the  mentality  and  mind  of 
Jesus  as  a  case  of  religious  paranoia.  Ascetic  habits  of  life, 
insomnia,  and  frequent  or  protracted  fasting,  usual  in  relig¬ 
ious  paranoia,  have  no  counterpart  in  the  life  of  Jesus.  But 
Baumann  does  find  two  of  the  stigmata  of  this  disease  in  Jesus’ 
personality,  namely,  the  concentration  of  mind  on  certain  ideas 
and  the  thereby  aggravated  imagination  (Werner).  The  fam¬ 
ily  of  Jesus  regarded  him  as  beside  himself ;  that  is  what  we 
would  term  inflicted  with  religious  paranoia.  We  could  con¬ 
tent  ourselves  with  excessive  nervousness  (Nervenueberrei- 
zung)  (S.  7). 

The  fixed  ideas,  upon  which  Jesus  came  to  concentrate  his 
thought  so  completely,  were  furnished  to  him  in  the  person 
and  preaching  of  the  Baptist.  Jesus’  strongly  stimulated 
fancy  accounts  for  his  hallucinations  of  sight  and  hearing  at 
the  Jordan  and  his  hallucinations  and  illusions  in  the  desert. 
His  Messianic  consciousness  was  suddenly  suggested  to  him  at 
his  baptism.  This  consciousness  was  reinforced  by  the  dem¬ 
oniacs  who  recognized  and  proclaimed  him  as  the  very  one  he 
believed  himself  to  be.  It  is  to  be  understood  only  in  the  light 
of  excessive  nervousness  (S.  JO). 

The  excited  state  of  mind,  in  which  he  found  himself  after 
the  experience  at  the  Jordan,  drove  him  into  the  desert  for 
prayer.  From  this  retreat  to  solitude  we  may  conclude  that 
Jesus  was  easily  fatigued  and  exhausted.  This  fact  is  further 
confirmed  by  Jesus  being  too  weak  to  carry  his  own  cross  and 
his  surprisingly  sudden  death  on  the  cross  which  was  unusual 
in  cases  of  this  manner  of  execution.  Even  his  withdrawal  with 
his  apostles  upon  their  return  from  their  mission  into  a  desert 
place  to  rest  for  a  while  (Me  6,31)  shows  that  Jesus  presup¬ 
posed,  that  the  apostolic  vocation  ( just  as  his  own)  was  fati¬ 
guing  (S.  16).  In  II  Cor  12,10  Paul  manifests  an  emotional 
make-up  similar  to  that  of  Jesus. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


109 


The  transfiguration  is  a  group-vision  in  which  all  four 
present  participate.  The  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  was  the  work 
of  an  ill-humor  (JUnmutswunder) ,  which  expressed  itself  inde¬ 
pendent  of  moral  considerations,  even  the  considerations  of 
good  sense  (S.  28).  Moreover,  Jesus’  conduct  and  words  dur¬ 
ing  his  Jerusalem  days  are  marked  by  a  climax  in  the  excessive 
nervous  overtension  in  which  he  found  himself.  His  word  con¬ 
cerning  mountain-moving  faith  is  an  expression  of  his  fitful 
nervousness.  In  his  eschatological  address  (Me  13,3-37)  Jesus 
manifests  that  greater  or  less  degree  of  nervous  excitement  so 
frequent  in  the  history  of  religion  and  in  cases  of  religious 
paranoia.  The  willing  spirit  in  Me  11,38  is  the  same  Nerv- 
enueberreizung. 

Jesus  was  a  poetic  nature  fond  of  rural  surroundings  as 
is  clear  from  his  parables.  He  possessed  a  romantic  and  one¬ 
sided  optimism.  He  saw  only  the  blessing  of  the  rain  and  sun¬ 
shine ;  he  did  not  think  of  the  floods  and  droughts.  He  saw 
the  hand  of  God  in  the  life  of  the  bird  that  must  neither  sow, 
nor  reap,  nor  gather  into  barns  without  thinking  of  the  mil¬ 
lions  that  perish  each  season.  He  saw  the  flowers  that  must 
neither  toil  nor  spin,  yet  surpassed  any  acquired  glory,  with¬ 
out  thinking  of  their  struggle  for  existence  and  their  being  at 
the  mercy  of  their  environment.  The  concluding  of  facts  from 
sentiments  of  a  desirable  nature  is  the  work  of  imagination 
through  and  through.  But  it  is  just  this  that  constitutes  the 
charm  of  Jesus’  character:  He  was  a  disposition  that  would 
help  all,  bodily  and  spiritually,  and  that  with  its  demands  holds 
itself  to  the  practically  important  phases  of  morality  (10  com¬ 
mandments)  and  besides  inspires  men  with  a  great  hope  ( the 
imminent  kingdom  of  God),  to  which  it  itself  gives  demonstra¬ 
tion  to  a  certain  extent,  and  at  the  same  time  gathers  about  it¬ 
self  simple  but  heroic  souls,  i.  e.,  men  whom,  like  himself,  suf¬ 
fering  imbues  all  the  more  with  lofty  sentiments  and  expecta¬ 
tions  (S.  17). 

Thus  Baumann  accounts  for  Jesus’  self-consciousness, 
conduct,  character,  and  teaching  by  the  state  of  nervous  ex¬ 
citement  in  which  he  so  often  found  himself. 

For  Baumann  there  is  much  in  Jesus’  temperament  and 


110 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


thought  which  must  be  rejected  under  the  test  of  modern  and 
strictly  scientific  methods  of  psychanalysis.  His  personal  re¬ 
turn  prophesied  for  his  own  generation  has  never  fulfilled  it¬ 
self.  He  ascribed  a  power  to  prayer  which  it  does  not  pos¬ 
sess.  His  miracles  are  to  be  rejected  in  so  far  as  they  have 
no  parallels  accomplished  by  modern  medicine  without  the  aid 
of  religion.  Critical  and  empirical  science  cannot  accept  his 
resurrection.  Jesus  was  over-tolerant  with  too  much  of  the 
world  and  preferred  suffering  instead  of  labor  as  the  way  of 
progress.  He  had  not  the  slightest  idea  of  science  and  his 
knowledge  was  restricted  to  the  few  erroneous  conceptions  of 
his  times. 

From  the  modern  point  of  view  Jesus  is  problematic  in 
his  ethics  and  eschatology.  His  conception  of  and  attitude 
toward  life  was  morally  practical  and  eschatological.  His 
ethics  were  probationary  and  provisional  ( Interims ethtit,  oder 
-moral),  analogous  to  the  special  measures  enacted  in  a  besieged 
city.  A  test  of  his  character  and  temperament  according  to 
present-day  scientific  methods  makes  it  impossible  that  we  re¬ 
spond  to  his  summons,  Repent  ye ,  and  believe  the  gospel.  It  is 
just  this  first  message  of  Jesus  that  betrays  an  inclination  to¬ 
ward  an  excessive  nervousness  that  breaks  forth  perhaps  sud¬ 
denly  (S.  56).  Pronounced  piety  is  often  characterized  by  an 
over  tense  nervous  excitement  in  which  it  seats  (Mohammed, 
Luther,  Swedenborg).  As  Peschel  says,  Certain  ideas  that  are 
common  throughout  the  world  are  the  consequence  of  a  natural 
intellectual  weakness ,  of  an  untamed  and  still  unbridled  imag¬ 
ination  similar  to  that  to  be  observed  in  the  undeveloped  child 
(Quoted  by  Bauman,  S.  57). 

Baumann  concludes  his  pamphlet  to  the  effect  that,  al¬ 
though  Jesus  has  much  to  say  to  us  today,  his  Gemuetsart  pre¬ 
vents  him  from  becoming  an  infallible  guide  in  matters  of  re¬ 
ligion  for  the  modern  man.  A  freer  path  must  be  cleared  for 
a  more  human  and  yet  a  more  serious  conception  of  religion. 
Knowledge  must  displace  faith.  The  modern  man  must  be  a 
moral  Christian  and  a  friend  of  science.  As  such  his  religion 
will  bear  the  sharpest  criticisms  of  thought  and  yet  prove  it¬ 
self  in  life. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


111 


It  is  interesting'  to  note  just  here  that  among  the  patho- 
graphers  of  Jesus,  Rasmussen,  de  Loosten,  Hirsch  and  Binet- 
Sangle,  not  one  knows  or  refers  to  the  work  of  any  of  the 
others.  Each  looks  upon  himself  as  doing  pioneer  work  in  this 
particular  field.  It  is  quite  understandable  that  Rasmussen  and 
de  Loosten  should  not  know  each  other,  for  their  works  ap¬ 
peared  close  together;  both  appeared  in  German  in  1905.  But 
it  is  surprising  that  neither  Hirsch  nor  Binet-Sangle  know  of 
their  works,  nor  of  the  work  of  each  other. 


5)  Jesus  in  Fiction 

In  recent  times  fiction  writers,  particularly  in  Germany, 
Denmark  and  Sweden,  have  taken  a  distinct  pathographic  turn 
and  seem  specially  fond  of  presenting  psychopathic  charac¬ 
ters  which  often  constitute  psychopathic  parallels  to  the  career, 
character,  and  personality  of  Jesus.  This  is  clear  in  Rasmus¬ 
sen’s  character  Fausto  in  his  four  act  passion  play,  Der  Zweite 
Heiland  (1906)  ;  in  Gerhart  Hauptmann’s  character  Emanuel 
Quint  in  his  novel,  Der  Narr  in  Christo  (1910)  ;  and  in  Bengt 
Berg’s  character  Virole  Skind  in  his  novel,  Genezareth  (1912) 
(1).  These  three  writers  of  fiction  make  it  clear  that  Dr. 
H.  Schaefer  is  fully  justified  in  speaking  of  the  psychiatry  of 
fiction  writers. 

Two  writers  of  fiction  in  particular,  Gustav  Frenssen  and 
Rudolf  von  Delius,  have  undertaken  character  studies  of  Jesus 
which  are  specially  interesting  in  our  present  survey. 

Gustav  Frenssen  in  his  Das  Leben  des  Heilancls  (Berlin, 
1907,  109  S. ;  a  separately  published  extract  from  his  novel 
Hilligenlei )  writes  of  Jesus,  He  lived  as  all  his  people  and  time 
in  a  charmed  world.  For  him  the  angels  of  God  descended  his 
whole  life  long.  He  saw  Satan  fallen  as  lightning  (S.  15),  The 
experience  at  the  Jordan  was  a  moment  of  being  beside  himself, 
a  rapturous  ecstasy  (S.  21).  There  was  often  the  danger 
that  Jesus  would  betray  his  heavenly  Father,  and  that  he  must 
return  to  his  native  village  as  a  simple  hand-worker,  but  as  a 

(1)  For  the  presentation  of  psychopathic  parallels  to  Jesus  in  recent 
fiction  see  Leipoldt’s  Vom  Jesusbilde  der  Gegenwart,  S.  177 ff. 


112 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


man  whose  soul  would  be  torn,  tormented  and  laid  waste  by 
pangs  of  conscience.  But  with  Peter’s  confession  at  Caesarea 
Philippi  and  his  premonition  of  the  parousia  his  soul  was  ex¬ 
alted  to  the  very  heights  of  heaven  and  expanded  until  it  com¬ 
passed  within  itself  the  whole  of  humanity.  His  soul  spun  mon¬ 
strous  thoughts  and  painted  pictures  of  extravagant  splendor. 
His  soul  mounted  to  the  very  limits  of  the  finite ,  even  to  the 
verge  of  a  sublime  insanity  (S.  57).  He  was  the  noblest  of  the 
children  of  men  (S.  81),  but  he  was  mistaken ,  particularly  in 
his  fine  and  fervent  childish  faith  (S.  101). 

Particularly  psychological  in  its  pretentions  is  the  little 
book  by  Rudolph  von  Delius,  Jesus :  sein  Kampf,  seine  Persoen- 
liclikeit,  und  seine  Legende  (Muenchen  1909,  182  S.)  Von  De¬ 
lius  gives  a  prominent  place  to  ecstasy  in  the  experience  of 
Jesus.  At  the  transfiguration  Jesus  is  again  profoundly  one 
with  the  Father ,  caught  away  in  ecstasy  (S.  66).  At  the 
cleansing  of  the  temple  a  sudden  rage  seizes  him  (S.  78).  In 
tracing  the  various  features  in  Jesus’  personality  von  Delius 
writes,  Jesus  was  a  fighting  heroic  person,  a  master  of  debate, 
a  ruthless  extreme  paradoxical  spirit,  a  heart  brimming  over 
with  its  thirst  for  love.  He  was  a  terrible  demolisher  and  yet 
a  mighty  lover.  Still  his  hate  never  found  a  worthy  foe,  nor 
his  heart  a  worthy  friend.  He  perished  before  the  callousness 
of  the  commonplace,  the  spiritlessness  of  the  sluggish  masses. 
{The  eternal  indolence  of  the  human  soul  killed  him )  (S.  107). 

In  Jerusalem  the  shrewd  general  in  him  saw  the  battle  lost. 
Then  his  fanatic-ego  hurled  itself  desperately  into  the  bright 
glow  of  a  fantastic  hope  (S.  108).  His  temper  flared  up  quick¬ 
ly,  but  his  fine  mind  promptly  subdued  it  again  (S.  109).  He 
must  retreat  to  the  loneliness  of  solitude  again  and  again  to 
wrestle  down  released  powers  of  soul . Sexual  ferment  re¬ 

solved  itself  into  passion  of  heart  and  ardor  of  soul.  He  re¬ 
quired  all  his  strength  for  his  struggle.  He  was  a  fighter 
through  and  through;  the  very  giftedness  of  his  intelligence 
was  combative.  His  mind  possessed  a  ghastly  fleetness  of 
thought,  a  fearfully  keen  penetration  of  every  other  mind,  a 
splendid  accuracy  in  singling  out  the  essential.  In  a  few  min¬ 
utes  in  the  midst  of  a  contention  he  found  words  that  bear  the 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


113 


golden  stamp  of  eternity  (S.  110).  Jesus  was  master  of  his 
own  ground,  ethics,  but  weak  in  metaphysical  debate.  He  often 
without  doubt  regretted  what  he  had  said  in  harsh  haste.  11  e 
see  in  Jesus  the  contrasting  states  of  soul  of  every  called  man : 
complete  confidence  alongside  most  dejected  depression  (S. 
116). 

Jesus’  impatience  with  the  dullness  of  his  disciples  on  vari¬ 
ous  occasions  zeigt  ihn  fast  nervoes-ueherreizt  (S.  123).  Jesus’ 
soul  was  rich  in  vision  (the  temptation,  the  baptism,  Lc  10,18; 
Mt  18,10),  but  pathological  states  never  had  decisive  influence 
on  him  (S.  120). 

6)  The  Defense  of  Jesus’  Psychic  Health 

The  attack  against  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  has  called 
forth  none  of  the  commotion  that  followed  upon  the  lives  of 
Jesus  by  Strauss  and  Renan,  or  that  attended  the  historicity 
debate.  (For  the  long  list  of  literature  called  forth  by  Strauss’ 
Leben  Jesu  see  A.  Schweitzer,  GdLJF,  S.  613ff ;  by  Renan’s 
La  Vie  de  Jesus,  S.  617ff ;  in  the  historicity  debate,  S.  198ff). 
The  imminent  conflict  which  Naumann  foretold  in  1906  did  not 
come.  Only  four  (to  the  writer’s  knowledge)  separately 
printed  replies,  all  pamphlets,  have  appeared  in  defense  of  the 
psychic  health  of  Jesus.  Otherwise  all  discussion  of  the  ques¬ 
tion  has  been  confined  to  brief  replies,  reviews,  and  mention  in 
theological  works  of  an  historical  character  and  various  relig¬ 
ious,  psychological  and  medical  periodicals.  This  all  goes  to 
show  that  not  only  the  Christian  world,  but  even  its  theologians 
have  not  taken  the  question  at  all  seriously.  In  fact,  the  num¬ 
ber  of  believing  Christians  who  know  that  the  psychic  health 
of  Jesus  has  ever  been  questioned  at  all  is  to  be  reckoned  with¬ 
in  the  few  thousands. 

We  begin  with  the  separately  printed  replies.  These  have 
come  from  theological,  both  Catholic  and  Protestant,  and  med¬ 
ical  circles. 

Hermann  Werner,  Pastor  Emeritus,  in  his  pamphlet,  Die 
psychisclie  Gesundheit  Jesu  ( Biblische  Zeit-  und  Streitfrcigen, 
IV.  Serie,  12.  Heft,  1908,  61  S.),  undertakes  to  meet  de  Loost- 
en  and  Rasmussen  on  their  own  ground.  He  is  well  qualified 


114 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


for  this  in  view  of  his  extended  experience  with  cases  of  mental 
alienation  and  his  observations  during  his  years  as  Pastor  at 
the  Hospital  for  the  Insane  in  Andernach  on  the  Rhine. 

On  the  basis  of  the  New  Testament  sources  and  general 
psychiatric  principles  he  refutes  de  Loosten’s  claim  that  Jesus 
suffered  under  some  hereditary  burden  and  was  infected  by  his 
milieu.  Against  de  Loosten’s  position  as  a  whole,  Werner 
writes  that  it  is  not  psychiatrically  permissible  to  speak  of  a 
partial  dementia,  for  once  a  mind  is  affected  in  one  phase  of 
its  activity,  say  the  emotions,  it  soon  brings  about  a  derange¬ 
ment  or  collapse  of  the  other  faculties,  say  the  intellectual  abil¬ 
ities,  which  de  Loosten  maintains  remained  unimpaired  in  the 
case  of  Jesus. 

Against  the  diagnosis  of  epilepsy,  Werner  points  out  that 
Rasmussen  bases  his  diagnosis  on  purely  psychic  symptoms, 
which  is  poor  psychiatry.  The  Gospels  furnish  positively  no 
instances  of  the  classic  epileptic  attack,  either  in  the  form  of 
petit  or  grand  mol,  in  the  case  of  Jesus.  There  is,  further,  no 
tr  ace  of  a  decline  in  Jesus’  intellectual  abilities  which,  almost 
without  exception,  overtakes  epileptic  victims. 

In  reply7  to  the  question,  TTYs  Jesus  Insane ?,  Werner  writes, 
One  will  never  be  able  to  demonstrate  with  tenable  reasons  that 
Jesus  was  an  alien  (S.  21). 

Against  O.  Holtzmann  and  Bousset,  Werner  urges  that 
nowhere  in  the  canonical  accounts  of  Jesus  do  the  character¬ 
istic  marks  of  ecstasy  appear.  Repeated  lapses  into  states  of 
ecstasy  would  have  broken  down  the  equilibrium  of  Jesus’  per¬ 
sonality.  Werner  does  admit  manifestations  in  Jesus  of,  what 
he  calls,  uneigentliche  Ekstase ,  which  in  no  sense  is  patholog¬ 
ical,  but  merely  the  concentration  of  thought  to  its  highest  de¬ 
gree  and  power;  such  ecstasy  would  only  be  natural  to  Jesus 
with  his  extraordinary  God-consciousness  (1). 

In  reply  to  the  question,  TT  as  Jesus  a  fanatic? ,  "Werner 
finds  that  Jesus’  sense  for  the  real  world  of  men  and  things, 
his  sobriety  and  prudence,  the  natural,  moral  and  religious  re¬ 
strictions  which  he  set  upon  himself,  his  tolerance  and  patience, 

(1)  Weber  remarks  that  Werners  distinction  between  a  major  and  a 
minor  ecstasy  is  artificial  (Sp.  234). 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


115 


the  privations  and  hardships  which  he  promised  his  followers, 
his  inwardization,  moralization  and  deepening  of  social  and  per¬ 
sonal  ethics,  are  all  the  exact  opposite  of  what  is  naturally  ex¬ 
pected  of  a  fanatic;  even  in  general  Jesus  nowhere  leaves  the 
impression  of  a  fanatic  (S.  15).  However,  Werner  feels  that 
Jesus  can  be  saved  from  fanaticism  only  by  the  elimination  of 
eschatology  from  his  thought  and  teachings,  and  allowing  it 
at  best  to  serve  only  as  a  dim  background  scarcely  discernible 
behind  him. 

Was  Jesus  abnormal?  Werner  sees  in  Jesus,  judged  ab¬ 
solutely,  the  only  really  normal  person  that  ever  lived.  But 
judged  by  our  usual  standards  of  normality,  Jesus  is  neither 
normal,  abnormal,  nor  subnormal,  but  supernormal.  At  this 
point,  Weber  says,  the  psychiatrist  cannot  follow  Werner,  but 
he  does  concede  that  according  to  the  Gospel  picture  Jesus  is 
the  most  perfect  representative  of  the  human  species  (Sp.  234?). 

W  erner  undertakes  to  demonstrate  the  positive  proof  of 
Jesus’  psychic  health  by  the  harmonious  functioning  of  his  in¬ 
tellectual,  emotional,  and  volitional  powers.  Indeed  this  soul 
life  presents  an  incomparable  example  of  the  complete  harmony 

of  all  psychic  powers .  To  him ,  the  one  without  sin ,  we 

are  compelled  to  extend  the  palm  in  matters  of  psychic  sounds 
ness  (S.  64). 

From  the  psychiatric  point  of  view  Werner’s  defense  of 
the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  is  well  to  the  point.  Historically, 
however,  in  spite  of  all  the  fine  and  forceful  appreciations  which 
he  knows  so  well  how  to  express  of  Jesus’  personality  and  work, 
his  pamphlet  is  unsatisfactory.  For  the  problem  of  Jesus’  self- 
consciousness  he  has  only  a  supernaturalistic  solution.  He  en¬ 
tirely  ignores  the  egocentric  words  of  Jesus,  which  are  psy- 
chiatrically  the  most  problematic  element  in  the  Gospels.  He 
meets  the  question  of  eschatology  only  by  rejecting  it.  On  the 
whole  he  tries  to  solve  historical  and  critical  problems  by  apolo¬ 
getics  and  homiletics. 

The  pamphlet,  Moderne  Leben-J esu-Forschung  unter  dem 
Einflusse  der  Psychiatrie :  eine  kritische  Darstellung  fuer 
Gebildete  aller  Staende  (Mainz,  1908,  76  S. ) ,  by  Dr.  Philipp 
Kneib,  Professor  of  Apologetics  at  the  University  of  Wuerz- 


116 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


burg,  is  written  from  the  Catholic  and  purely  apologetic  view¬ 
point.  It  is  directed  against  the  modern  Willensrichtung  which 
makes  the  questioning  of  Jesus’  psychic  health  possible.  He 
laments,  How  many  false  judgments  the  exalted  person  of  the 
savior  of  the  world  must  suffer  patiently  even  during  his  earthly 
life ,  and  still  more  in  the  course  of  history !  (S.  5). 

Kneib  proceeds  against  particular  points  in  the  positions 
of  de  Loosten,  Rasmussen,  Baumann,  and  Holtzmann.  In  a 
characteristic  apologetic  way,  he  points  out  that  what  is  a 
symptom  of  one  mental  malady  for  one  is  a  symptom  of  some 
other  psychic  disease  for  the  other.  He  devotes  seventeen 
pages  to  the  metaphysical  possibility  of  miracle  in  general,  the 
historical  necessity  of  miracle  in  the  career  of  Jesus  in  partic¬ 
ular,  and  the  historicity  of  Jesus’  miracles  in  toto.  The  rais¬ 
ing  of  Jairus’  daughter  must  be  a  real  raising  from  the  dead, 
otherwise  the  physician  Luke  would  not  have  reported  it.  The 
cursing  of  the  fig  tree  should  not  be  taken  with  such  tragic 
seriousness,  for  the  “ defenseless ”  tree  felt  nothing  (S.  50). 

Eschatology  is  to  be  explained  by  the  symbolic  and  figur¬ 
ative  character  of  Oriental  thought  and  language.  The  par- 
ousia  came  in  the  form  of  the  descent  of  the  Holy  Spirit  and 
the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  in  definite  fulfillment  of  Mt  10,23. 
In  all  of  the  76  pages  Kneib  cites  less  than  a  score  of  verses 
from  the  Gospels  in  support  of  his  position;  such  is  the  extent 
of  his  historical  criticism. 

It  suffices  to  say  that  Kneih’s  pamphlet  in  no  way  con¬ 
stitutes  a  contribution  to  the  solution  of  the  problem  of  the 
psychic  health  of  Jesus.  A.  Schweitzer  passes  over  Kneib’s 
work  with  the  sole  remark,  Kneib  must  be  left  out  of  considera¬ 
tion  entirely  (GdLJF,  S.  365). 

Dr.  H.  Schaefer,  Head-Physician  at  the  Friedrichsberg 
Hospital  for  the  Insane  in  Hamburg,  directs  his  little  book, 
Jesus  in  psychiatrischer  Beleuchtung.  Eine  Kontroverse  (Ber¬ 
lin,  1908,  178  S.),  against  de  Loosten.  Baumann  and  Holtz¬ 
mann,  he  says,  cannot  come  into  consideration,  for  their  respec¬ 
tive  diagnoses  of  Nervenueberreizung  and  ecstasy  are  too  inde¬ 
finite  designations  to  furnish  a  starting  point  for  scientific  refu¬ 
tation.  Rasmussen  deals  with  epilepsy  in  such  an  amateur  way 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


117 


that  the  psychiatrist  cannot  follow  him  in  his  conclusions. 
Therefore,  Schaefer  devotes  only  a  few  pages  in  his  introduc¬ 
tion  to  Rasmussen,  his  chief  criticism  being  that  the  morbid 
prophetic  type,  of  which  Rasmussen  makes  so  much,  is  not  found 
in  epilepsy  but  in  cases  of  religious  paranoia. 

Schaefer  finds  that,  in  the  case  of  Jesus,  the  psychiatrist 
must  obligate  himself  to  the  most  careful  scientific  conscien¬ 
tiousness.  He  proposes  to  go  directly  to  the  sources  them¬ 
selves  and  investigate  the  ancestry  and  childhood  of  Jesus,  his 
baptism,  miracles,  alleged  lack  of  natural  human  feelings,  par¬ 
ticularly  in  regard  to  the  family,  his  morbid  emotions  and  hal¬ 
lucinations,  the  judgment  of  his  contemporaries,  his  conscious¬ 
ness  as  the  Son  of  God  and  the  Messiah,  and  his  work  as  a 
reformer. 

Schaefer  finds  no  basis  in  the  sources  for  the  assumption 
of  an  hereditary  burden.  There  is  no  evidence,  which  psychia¬ 
try  could  accept,  of  the  Baptist’s  paranoia.  At  twelve  years 
Jesus  manifests  the  first  signs  of  his  future  greatness  as  have 
many  other  great  personages  at  a  much  earlier  and  more  un¬ 
natural  age.  Jesus’  miracles  are  to  be  explained  by  sugges¬ 
tion,  auto-suggestion,  group-  and  mass-suggestion  (the  miracle 
at  Cana  and  the  feedings).  The  demoniacs  were  hysterics, 
Jairus’  daughter  a  case  of  catalepsy,  and  Lazarus  a  premature 
burial.  Jesus  was  a  fascinating  therapeutist  who  cured  by  sug¬ 
gestion,  thoroughly  optima  fide  (S.  ()8). 

A  defect  in  the  affections  for  one’s  own  family,  Schaefer 
says,  the  psychiatrist  regards  as  a  sign  of  degeneration,  but 
by  this  he  means  something  entirely  different  from  anything 
that  Jesus  manifested.  Pendulum-like  swings  of  the  emotions 
from  one  extreme  to  the  other  are  normal  as  long  as  there  ex¬ 
ists  a  stimulation  sufficiently  strong  to  explain  their  intensity ; 
we  find  no  unoccasioned  emotional  eruptions  in  the  case  of 
Jesus.  It  is  rather  an  unbroken  and  uninterrupted  emotional 
monotony  that  is  to  be  regarded  as  morbid.  Regarding  any 
reference  to  illusions  or  hallucinations  of  Jesus,  Schaefer  re¬ 
minds  his  readers  that  both  pathological  in  themselves,  can  and 
do  appear  isolated  and  occasionally  with  persons  of  unques¬ 
tionable  mental  soundness  and  are  not  per  se  manifestations  of 


118 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


mental  morbidness.  On  the  temptation  he  remarks  that  a  psy¬ 
chopath,  who  had  withheld  himself  from  food  for  forty  days 
during  which  he  had  undergone  a  psychosis,  would  hardly  have 
emerged  alive,  to  say  nothing  of  entering  upon  a  public  career 
soon  after. 

The  harsh  judgment  of  Jesus’  contemporaries  against  him 
is,  for  the  most  part,  to  be  understood  as  slander  and  insult 
which  was  inspired  by  hatred  and  hostility.  Me  3,21  is  only  an 
expression  of  the  care  and  concern  for  Jesus’  safety  on  the 
part  of  his  friends  and  family,  even  perhaps  a  ruse  to  rescue 
him  from  a  feared  fate. 

The  content  of  Jesus’  teaching,  the  product  of  his  own 
psychic  activity,  is  a  good  criterion  of  his  mental  health;  for 
this  clinical  psychiatry  can  furnish  no  parallels.  His  concep¬ 
tion  of  man  and  his  mission  is  the  highest  accomplishment  of 
human  intelligence.  As  a  reformer  and  genius,  who  created  a 
religion  of  greater  moral  power,  Jesus  is  without  paranoiac 
or  other  parallels. 

A  point  of  particular  strength  in  Schaefer’s  work  is  that 
he  sees  in  the  problem  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  the  crux  of 
the  whole  question  of  his  psychic  health.  On  this  point  he 
furnishes  some  interesting  and  instructive  clinical  contrasts  of 
paranoiac  self-consciousness  which  clear  Jesus  of  all  symptoms 
of  ps>Tchic  degenerac}r  in  this  respect.  Historically  he  leaves 
the  problem  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  untouched. 

Schaefer’s  book  is  a  specially  valuable  psychiatric  contri¬ 
bution  to  the  problem  of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus  because 
of  the  light  which  he  throws  on  it  by  the  comparative  psycho¬ 
pathic  materials  (As  Dr.  Weber  remarks,  some  of  these  ma¬ 
terials  are  too  anecdotal  to  be  valuable)  he  assembles  and  his 
observations  on  morbid  psychology.  Though  he  strikes  out  the 
right  path  by  turning  to  the  investigation  of  the  sources,  his 
chief  weakness  is  historico-critical.  He  is  not  well  oriented  in 
the  results  of  historical  criticism.  All  Jesus’  miracles  have  a 
natural  explanation.  The  dove  at  the  baptism  was  a  real  dove 
that  fluttered  for  a  moment  about  the  head  of  Jesus  and  gave 
rise  to  the  illusion.  The  voice  was  an  hallucination  on  an  ap¬ 
perceptive  basis  of  Jesus’  previous  mental  preoccupation,  or 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


119 


he  might  have  faintly  overheard  a  whisper  of  some  one  present. 
Schaefer  interprets  Jesus’  words  regarding  the  parousia,  his 
role  in  the  final  judgment  of  human  fate,  and  the  resurrection 
as  symbolic  and  figurative ;  the  kingdom  of  God  was  a  purely 
abstract  notion  in  the  thought  of  Jesus. 

Albert  Schweitzer’s  pamphlet,  Die  psychiatrische  Beur- 
teilung  Jesu.  Darstellung  uiid  Kritik  ( Tuebingen ,  1913, 
46  S.),  is  his  dissertation  for  the  Doctorate  of  Medicine  which 
he  published  in  keeping  with  his  promise  in  his  Geschiclite  der 
Leben-J  esu-F  or  seining  (S.  367,  Anm.  1)  in  defense  of  the  psy¬ 
chic  health  of  the  Jesus  of  eschatology  as  attacked  by  H.  J. 
Holtzmann,  Werner,  Theobald  Ziegler,  Juelicher,  and  Well- 
hausen.  Holtzmann  finds  that  in  reading  Schweitzer’s  purely 
eschatological  interpretation  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  that 
he  cannot  forget  the  words  idee  fixe  (MBJ,  S.  80).  Ziegler 
writes,  Those  who  are  acquainted  with  Schweitzer s  eschatolo¬ 
gical  picture  of  Jesus  will  have  to  concede  that  Strauss  was 
right  when  he  said  that  such  is  not  the  thought  world  of  a 
healthy,  but  of  a  pathological,  alienated  mind  (II  609).  Wer¬ 
ner,  in  his  pamphlet  already  reviewed,  says  that  Schweitzer’s 
Jesus  is  so  consistently  controlled  in  all  his  acts,  teaching  and 
suffering  by  eschatological  expectations  that  there  is  nothing 
left  to  do  but  assign  him  a  place  in  the  ranks  of  the  psycho¬ 
paths  (PGJ,  S.  13).  In  1911  he  again  writes,  the  Danielic- 
apocalyptic  Messianic  consciousness  of  the  historical  Jesus  of 
liberal  theology  was  by  no  means  as  harmless  as  one  thought, 
and  is  thoroughly  incompatible  with  psychic  soundness  (NKZ, 
S.  369).  Concerning  the  parousia  Wellhausen  writes,  Accord¬ 
ing  to  the  opinion  of  not  a  few  even  orthodox  theologians  Jesus 
himself  is  said  to  have  been  the  fanatic  who  emphatically  held 

out  the  prospect  of  his  parousia .  Decently  Albert 

Schweitzer  has  followed  in  the  footsteps  of  Strauss,  although 
the  fanaticism  of  Jesus  does  not  repel  him  as  it  did  the  latter, 
but  attracts  (Einl.  S.  150f).  Juelicher  sees  in  Jesus’  self- 
consciousness  as  interpreted  by  Schweitzer  only  an  insane  con¬ 
ceit  which  no  eschatological  enthusiasm  excuses  (Quoted  by  H. 
J.  Holtzmann,  MBJ.,  S.  81).  It  is  in  the  light  of  these  eriti- 


120 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


cisms  that  the  polemic  character  of  Schweitzer’s  pamphlet  is  to 
be  understood. 

Schweitzer  finds  that  pathography  has  recently  fallen  in¬ 
to  serious  discredit  because  its  methods,  which  in  the  hands  of 
specialists  and  with  proper  restrictions  can  render  valuable 
service,  have  been  applied  by  amateurs  with  insufficient  psy¬ 
chiatric  experience  and  with  little  knowledge  of  the  sources  they 
undertake  to  investigate.  The  one  who  undertakes  to  investi¬ 
gate  the  case  of  Jesus  must  be  able  to  pass  both  expert  his¬ 
torical  and  psychiatric  judgment;  this  he  believes  that  he  is 
able  to  do  since  he  has  studied  both  theology  and  medicine 
(Schweitzer  has  his  doctorate  in  both  philosophy  and  medicine; 
he  was  for  a  time  Professor  of  Theology  in  Strassburg  in 
Alsace). 

It  is  against  the  pathographic  literature  that  Schweitzer 
proceeds:  de  Loosten,  Hirsch,  and  Binet-Sangle  (Schweitzer 
is  the  first  to  take  up  a  refutation  of  Binet-Sangle).  He  mere¬ 
ly  mentions  O.  Holtzmann  and  Baumann ;  to  Rasmussen  he  de¬ 
votes  two  pages  at  the  close  of  his  pamphlet  and  finds  that  the 
comparative  study  by  Rasmussen  is  medically  worthless. 
These  three  fall  naturally  into  the  same  group  because  of  their 
common  diagnosis  of  paranoia.  Further,  Schweitzer  must  re¬ 
fute  them  in  particular,  for  the  chief  psychiatric  charge  against 
the  Jesus  of  eschatology  must  be  paranoia. 

Schweitzer  regards  Mt  and  Me  as  the  only  reliable  sources, 
but  even  they  contain  here  and  there  later  misunderstandings 
and  disfigurations,  and  report  the  public  career  of  Jesus  as  at 
most  a  year  in  length. 

Jesus’  message  from  the  first  to  the  last  was,  the  kingdom 
of  God  is  at  hand.  This  kingdom  is  Messianic ;  it  is  a  super¬ 
natural  order  which  in  the  near  future  is  to  displace  the  present 
order  by  cosmic  catastrophe.  In  Jesus’  thought  is  completed, 
for  the  first  time,  the  identification  of  the  Messiah  and  the  Son 
of  man. 

This  supernatural  dignity  Jesus  does  not  possess  on  earth, 
it  is  reserved  for  him  at  the  parousia ;  Jesus’  own  conviction 
of  his  identity  does  not  figure  in  his  message,  but  is  a  secret 
which  he  carefully  guards.  For  the  general  public  he  is  only 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


121 


and  always  the  prophet  of  Nazareth.  At  the  transfiguration 
three  of  his  disciples  learn  his  secret  which  Peter  betrays  to  the 
twelve  at  Caesarea  Philippi  and  Judas  to  the  authorities  in 
Jerusalem.  But  Judas  was  the  sole  witness,  and  Jesus  could  be 
condemned  to  death  only  by  the  testimony  of  a  second  witness, 
which  came  in  the  form  of  his  own  confession  during  his  trial. 
Jesus  could  have  saved  himself  by  silence,  but  it  was  his  set 
purpose  to  die  and  thus  force  the  kingdom  of  God  to  appear. 

Jesus’  determination  upon  his  death  arose  out  of  the  course 
of  the  events  themselves.  Jesus  did  not  spend  the  entire  period 
between  his  first  public  appearance  and  his  death  in  public  ac¬ 
tivity.  He  expected  the  appearance  of  the  parousia  before  the 
disciples  returned  from  their  mission  (Mt  10,23).  In  this  Jesus 
was  disappointed,  for  the  disciples  returned  and  he  resorted 
to  the  north  with  them  where  he  seeks  to  remain  incognito  dur¬ 
ing  the  fall  and  winter.  Here  he  comes  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  parousia  will  be  indefinitely  delayed  unless  he  suffers  and 
dies.  This  thought  was  suggested  to  him  by  the  death  of  the 
Baptist  which  had  intervened  and  in  whom  he  sees  the  promised 
Elias.  He,  therefore,  proceeds  to  Jerusalem  in  order  to  com¬ 
pel  the  parousia  by  his  death  on  the  cross. 

A  chief  point  of  strength  in  Schweitzer’s  critical  contri¬ 
bution  to  the  solution  of  the  problem  of  Jesus’  psychic  health 
is  his  rejection  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  as  a  reliable  historical  source 
concerning  Jesus  and  which  makes  the  pathographic  position 
possible.  He  further  points  out  that  the  later  Judaic  apoca¬ 
lyptic  world-view  explains  Jesus’  striking  picture  of  the  future; 
of  this  the  pathographers  take  no  consideration. 

From  the  psychiatric  point  of  view,  Schweitzer  calls  at¬ 
tention  to  the  fact  that  a  diagnosis  of  a  Wahnidee  depends 
much  more  upon  the  rise  and  development,  the  manner  and  way 
in  which  it  expresses  itself,  than  upon  the  content  of  the  idea 
itself.  The  sources  furnish  us  no  materials  for  tracing  the 
rise  and  development  of  a  psychosis  in  the  case  of  Jesus ;  this 
is  difficult  enough  in  a  living  subject  where  repeated  and  ex¬ 
tended  observation  is  possible.  If  Jesus  had  been  an  ordinary 
paranoiac,  he  would  have  hardly  been  able  to  win  and  retain 
disciples.  That  Jesus  could  not  have  had  repeated  hallucina- 


122 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


tions  is  seen  from  the  fact  that  paranoiac  subjects  are  usually 
rendered  incapable  of  subsequent  occupation  and  their  acts  sel¬ 
dom  correspond  to  the  contents  of  their  Wahnidee.  Paranoiacs 
seldom  draw  practical  conclusions  from  their  illusions  or  W ahn- 
ideen.  Jesus’  self-consciousness  of  being  the  Son  of  God  is 
not  clinical  in  character,  but  is  the  same  as  that  which  the  old 
Jewish  kings  claimed  for  themselves  and  the  people  ascribed  to 
them  as  God’s  representatives.  Schweitzer  regards  Jesus  as 
actually  of  Davidic  descent.  Insight  into  the  career  of  Jesus 
delivers  him  from  the  alleged  delusions  of  persecution.  There 
is  no  transformation  in  Jesus’  delusion  that  is  not  objectively 
motived  and  logically  consequent.  Jesus  showed  himself  in- 
fluenceable  in  a  way  and  to  a  degree  that  forms  a  direct  con¬ 
trast  to  the  paranoiac.  He  further  lacks  the  unmotived  and 
mistaken  antagonistic  aggressiveness  of  the  active  paranoiac 
type,  and  the  restricted  resistance  or  resistlessness  of  the  more 
passive  type. 

In  conclusion  Schweitzer  sums  up  the  weaknesses  of  the 
pathographic  position  of  de  Loosten,  Hirsch,  and  Binet-San- 
gle:  they  employ,  for  the  most  part,  unhistorical  material; 
they  have  no  historical  appreciation  of  the  thought  of  Jesus’ 
times  and  people  and  no  insight  into  the  problems  of  Jesus’ 
public  career;  from  these  false  presuppositions  and  with  the 
aid  of  highly  hypothetic  symptoms  they  manufacture  a  diag¬ 
nosis  that  is  by  no  means  psychiatrically  faultless.  The  only 
possible  historical  material  for  an  eventual  pathographic 
study  is  Jesus’  high  estimate  of  himself  and  the  hallucinations 
at  the  baptism,  which  are  insufficient  for  the  confirmation  of 
a  mental  malady. 

In  spite  of  its  brevity  and  exclusively  eschatological  em¬ 
phasis  Schweitzer’s  reply  is  the  best,  for  he  leaves  the  conten¬ 
tion  where  it  belongs,  on  historico-critical  ground.  However, 
his  eschatological  exposition  of  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  is 
as  unsatisfactory  as  any  of  the  pathographic  interpretations 
of  it. 

The  problem  of  Jesus’  psychic  health  has  found  brief 
mention  and  review  in  works  which  aim  at  an  historical  presen- 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


123 


tation  of  the  various  estimates,  past  and  present,  of  Jesus’ 
work,  person,  and  character. 

Johannes  Leipoldt,  Professor  of  Theology  in  Kiel,  in  his 
work,  Vom  Jesusbilde  der  Ge genii'  art  ( Leipzig  1913,  445S.), 
devotes  chapter  three  to  Die  Aerzte  (S.  141-204)  (1). 

He  knows  O.  Holtzmann’s  book  which,  he  says,  presents  little 
material  that  is  valuable  from  the  medical  point  of  view.  He 
finds  that  every  person  is  an  ecstatic  in  the  sense  of  Holtz¬ 
mann’s  use  of  the  word  ecstasy.  He  regards  Holtzmann’s  un¬ 
derstanding  and  interpretation  of  Jesus  as  an  ecstatic  in  the 
pathological  and  morbid  sense.  The  effect  of  the  ecstatic  ele¬ 
ment  in  Jesus  upon  his  whole  personality,  that  of  calming  down 
rather  than  stimulating,  which  Holtzmann  constitutes,  is  so  un¬ 
natural  and  unusual  that  the  medical  expert  would  not  call  it 
ecstasy  at  all.  Leipoldt  reviews  briefly  the  works  of  Rasmus¬ 
sen,  de  Loosten,  and  Baumann ;  he  knows  only  the  first  two  vol¬ 
umes  of  Binet-Sangle.  Specially  interesting  is  Leipoldt’s  re¬ 
view  of  the  recent  presentations  in  fiction  of  characters  creat¬ 
ed  as  psychopathic  parallels  to  Jesus  (see  above  p.  11  Iff). 
Among  the  refutations  Leipoldt  knows  Kneib,  Werner,  and 
Schaefer. 

Hermann  Jordan,  Professor  at  the  University  of  Erlan¬ 
gen,  in  his  little  book,  Jesus  und  die  modernen  Jesusbilder 
( Biblische  Zeit-  und  Streitfragen,  V.  Serie,  5/6.  Heft ,  1909), 
devotes  pages  42-55  to  Der  kranke  Jesus  ( The  Morbid  Jesus). 
He  mentions  only  Rasmussen  and  de  Loosten,  and  their  oppon¬ 
ents,  Werner  and  Kneib,  also  F.  Moerchen  and  J.  Naumann. 
Jordan  remarks  very  pertinently  that  the  question  of  the  psy¬ 
chic  health  of  Jesus  is  chiefly  historical  and  critical,  and  that 
the  sources  furnish  no  adequate  basis  for  a  pathological  study 
of  Jesus,  for  in  them  cannot  be  traced  any  psychological  de¬ 
velopments  or  changes  from  one  phase  to  another.  He  finds 
nothing  morbid  in  the  impression  which  Jesus  made  upon  his 
contemporaries,  in  the  reported  visions  which  are,  for  the  most 


(1)  The  writer  is  indebted  to  Professor  Eduard  Riggenbach  of  Basel 
University  for  calling  his  attention  to  this  interesting  chapter  and  for  the 
gift  of  a  copy  of  this  work  from  his  private  library. 


124 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


part,  literary  creations,  nor  in  Jesus’  exalted  self-conscious¬ 
ness  eo  ipso. 

H.  Weinel  in  his  Jesus  im  19 ten  Jahrhundert  mentions 
Rasmussen  and  the  psychiatric  problem  in  only  one  brief  para¬ 
graph  (S.  283). 

G.  Pfannmueller  in  his  Jesus  im  Urteil  der  Jahrhunderte 
merely  mentions  0.  Holtzmann  and  de  Loosten,  and  devotes  a 
brief  section  to  Rasmussen  (S.  408f). 

A.  Schweitzer  in  his  Geschichte  der  Leben-J esu-F or s chung 
devotes  pages  362-367  to  the  psychiatric  studies  of  Jesus ;  here 
he  mentions  Rasmussen,  de  Loosten,  Binet-Sangle,  and  Bau¬ 
mann  with  their  opponents  Werner,  Kneib,  and  Schaefer. 

G.  Stanley  Hall  in  his  two  volume  work,  Jesus  the  Christ 
in  the  Light  of  Psychology ,  devotes  pages  157-172  of  the  first 
volume  to  the  psychiatric  problem.  He  briefly  reviews  the 
works  of  Rasmussen,  de  Loosten,  Holtzmann,  Hirsch,  and  Bin¬ 
et-Sangle  (only  the  first  volume)  ;  among  the  replies,  Werner 
and  Schaefer. 

Mention  has  already  been  made  of  Loofs’  review  of  the  psy¬ 
chiatric  problem  in  his  book,  Wer  War  Jesus  Christus?  (See 
above  p.  39ff). 

The  problem  of  Jesus’  psychic  health  has  naturally  found 
its  wray  into  religious  periodicals  in  the  form  of  reviews  and 
criticisms  of  the  works  of  Rasmussen  and  de  Loosten  who  are 
the  most  generally  known. 

F.  Niebergall  of  Heidelberg  reviews  Rasmussen’s  book  in 
the  Zeitschrift  fuer  Religionspsychologie  ( Band  Heft  5., 
1907,  S.  223-226)  with  the  remark  that  confessed  Christians 
have  little  to  fear  and  psychiatrists  have  much  less  to  learn 
from  it  than  is  commonly  supposed. 

G.  Hollmann  in  the  Theologische  Rundschau  (9.  Jahrgang , 
Heft  7,  Juli  1906,  S.  270-275)  reviews  briefly  the  works  of 
R  asmussen  and  de  Loosten.  (See  his  conclusion  above  p.  40f). 

H.  Windisch,  in  the  same  periodical  (17.  Jahrgang ,  Heft 
12.,  1913,  S.  439-441),  reviews  Schweitzer’s  dissertation  and 
finds  it  pertinent  at  points  but  not  thorough  enough. 


THE  PROBLEM  PROPER 


125 


Mention  has  already  been  made  of  Werner’s  article  in  the 
Neue  Kirchliche  Zeitschrift  (see  above  p.  42f). 

J.  Naumann,  in  discussing  the  books  of  Rasmussen  and  de 
Loosten  comforts  the  readers  of  the  Christliche  Welt  (No.  12, 
Maerz  22.,  1906,  Sp.  266-271)  with  the  remark,  Vagaries  are 
a  part  of  the  progress  of  science.  Against  Rasmussen  he  al¬ 
leges  a  false  and  superficial  method  born  of  textbooks  on  psy¬ 
chiatry  rather  than  of  concrete  clinical  observations  ;  he  has 
gone  through  the  psychiatric  problem  as  an  enslaved  rather 
than  as  a  free  man.  His  chief  criticism  of  de  Loosten  is  his 
indiscriminate  use  of  sources.  At  the  close  of  his  article  he 
again  consoles  his  readers  to  the  effect  that  Jesus  has  stood  in 
judgment,  not  onl}T  before  the  High  Priest  and  Pilate,  but  be¬ 
fore  the  courts  of  philosophers,  statesmen,  historians,  and 
scientists,  and  he  will  again  return  victorious  from  before  the 
seat  of  the  psychiatrist. 

Dr.  Fr.  Moer chen’s  article,  Zur  psychiatrisclnen  Betracli - 
tung  des  ueherlieferten  Christushildes  ( Monatsschrift  fuer  die 
kirchliche  Praxis,  October  1906,  10  Heft,  S.  122-26),  is  writ¬ 
ten  from  the  medical  point  of  view.  Dr.  Moerchen  emphasizes 
the  difficulties  in  the  way  of  a  psychiatric  diagnosis  of  the  mind 
of  Jesus.  The  sources  he  finds  inadequate  for  a  definite  diag¬ 
nosis  ;  such  materials  as  they  do  contain  can  lead  modern  med¬ 
ical  science  to  no  definite  results.  A  scientific  expert  judgment 
of  the  psychic  status  of  Jesus  is  so  impeded  that  the  attempt 
to  establish  a  definite  diagnosis  must  from  the  very  start  be 
designated  as  hopeless  (S.  424).  He  does  say,  however,  that  the 
striking  self-consciousness  of  Jesus  furnishes  a  real  subject  for 
psychiatric  discussion.  This  feature  of  Jesus’  personality  he 
designates  as  abnormal,  but  hesitates  to  describe  as  patho¬ 
logical. 

The  best  periodical  review  and  criticism  in  the  psychiatric 
discussion  is  that  of  the  works  of  Werner  and  Schaefer  by  Dr. 
William  Weber  in  the  Theologische  Liter  at  urzeitung,  1911, 
Nr.  8,  Sp.  232-86. 

Karl  Beth’s  article,  Jesus  in  psychiatrischer  Beleuchtung, 
in  the  bimonthly  Maerz  (4,18;  16.  Sept.  1910,  S.  459-467)  and 


1 26 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


E.  K.  Zelenka’s  article  with  the  identical  title  in  the  Deutscher 
Merkur  (42,24)  were  not  accessible  to  the  writer. 

In  conclusion  we  may  say  that  the  replies  and  refutations 
of  the  works  of  Jesus’  pathographers  have  been  either  too 
apologetic  or  too  academic  in  their  interests  and  intentions  to 
be  adequate.  None  has  undertaken  a  serious  and  systematic 
sifting  of  the  sources.  Binet-Sangle  has  received  practically 
no  attention  and  he,  more  than  all  others,  pronounces  Jesus  in¬ 
sane  in  every  wTord  and  act  that  is  ascribed  to  him  in  the  writ¬ 
ten  sources  that  have  come  dowrn  to  us. 

We  turn,  therefore,  to  a  systematic  sifting  of  the  sources 
in  quest  and  investigation  of  the  materials  that  have  been  ex¬ 
ploited  in  support  of  the  pathographic  contention  against 
Jesus. 


CHAPTER  IV 


The  Sources  from  the  Pathographic  Point  of  View 

The  literary  sources  of  our  knowledge  concerning  Jesus, 
the  only  sources  that  we  possess,  are  not  all  that  could  be  wished 
for.  In  the  first  place,  we  have  nothing  from  Jesus’  own  hand. 
So  far  as  we  know,  Jesus  wrote  only  upon  one  occasion  and 
that  was  on  the  ground  (Jn  8,6).  If  we  possessed  something 
from  Jesus’  own  hand,  as  we  do  in  the  case  of  Paul  whose  let¬ 
ters  contain  numerous  valuable  personal  confessions  and  rem¬ 
iniscences  that  we  would  never  know  if  we  had  only  the  accounts 
of  him  and  his  missionary  enterprises  as  found  in  the  book  of 
Acts,  we  would  be  much  more  fortunately  situated.  For  it  is 
often  the  personal  confessions  and  reminiscences  of  the  great 
personages  of  history  that  give  us  our  best  and  most  reliable 
knowledge  of  them,  and,  in  connection  with  our  present  prob¬ 
lem,  furnish  the  materials  which  make  a  pathographic  diagnosis 
possible.  But  Jesus  has  left  us  no  diary,  no  autobiography, 
no  personal  confessions  and  reminiscences,  no  correspondence 
of  any  kind. 

In  the  second  place,  we  see  Jesus  as  he  is  presented  in  the 
Gospels  only  through  the  eyes  of  admiring  and  devoted  dis¬ 
ciples  whose  records  of  him  were  written  with  a  pure  propa¬ 
ganda  purpose  in  the  interests  of  the  spread  of  the  Christian 
faith,  and  only  after  the  elapse  of  at  least  three  decades  after 
his  death  on  the  cross.  These  Gospels,  documents  of  faith 
rather  than  of  history  as  we  today  conceive  it,  often  manifest 
clearly  the  highest  idealization  of  their  hero,  and  the  historical 
facts  which  they  report  are  often  so  colored  by  the  fervent  faith 
that  inspired  their  recording  that  some  (Wellhausen  and 
Wrede)  can  entertain  only  the  most  sceptical  attitude  toward 
them  as  historical  documents.  The  records  of  Jesus’  words  and 
deeds  as  they  stand  in  the  New  Testament  have  been  strongly 

127 


128 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


christianized.  This  Christianization  of  Jesus’  words,  in  partic¬ 
ular,  and  deeds  was  only  a  most  natural  process  which  is  at 
once  understood  when  we  begin  to  realize  the  vitality  of  the 
early  Christian  faith  out  of  which  these  records  of  him  organ¬ 
ically  grew. 

Over  against  all  of  these  historical  limitations  and  handi¬ 
caps,  we  can  say  that  we  nevertheless  possess  as  full  and  re¬ 
liable  information  concerning  Jesus  as  we  do  of  any  other  great 
man  of  that  early  date. 

1)  The  Fourth  Gospel 

From  Strauss  ( Leben  Jesu  1835;  I  483-518,  700-745;  II 
134-175,  221-237 )  down  to  Wernle  ( Quellen ,  S.  17-31;  Engl, 
trans.,  p.  25-57)  the  Fourth  Gospel  has  been  consistently  re¬ 
jected  by  liberal  theologians  as  a  source  of  reliable  knowledge 
concerning  what  Jesus  said  and  did;  that  is,  with  the  excep¬ 
tion  of  certain  chronological  data  concerning  the  date  of  Jesus’ 
public  appearance  and  his  death. 

We  are  now  interested  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  only  as  it 
concerns  our  present  task  of  sifting  the  sources.  (For  a  con¬ 
cise  summary  of  the  historical  grounds  on  which  the  Fourth 
Gospel  has  been  rejected  see  L.  Jackson’s  book,  The  Problem 
of  the  Fourth  Gospel,  Chapter  Y,  pp.  49-82;  for  a  more  elab¬ 
orate  treatment  see  P.  W.  Schmiedel’s  book,  Das  vierte  Evan- 
gelium  gegenueber  den  drei  ersten). 

It  is  not  for  historical  and  critical  reasons  that  we  here 
make  a  separate  treatment  of  the  Fourth  Gospel,  but  it  is  the 
fact  that  the  pathographers,  those  who  diagnose  paranoia, 
have  drawn  most  of  their  materials  from  the  Fourth  Gospel. 
As  Schweitzer  has  pointed  out,  three-fourths  of  the  materials 
employed  by  Hirsch,  de  Loosten  and  Binet-Sangle  are  taken 
from  the  Fourth  Gospel  (1).  These  three  writers  all 
agree  in  their  diagnosis  of  paranoia,  and  it  is  the  Fourth 
Gospel  that  furnishes  them  their  materials  for  this  conclusion. 
It  is  at  this  point  that  the  liberals  can  throw  a  destructive 
bomb  into  the  conservative  camp  occupied  by  Loofs  and  Wer- 

(1)  See  abundant  references  to  the  Fourth  Gospel  in  Hirsch,  Chapter 
VII;  throughout  de  Loosten’s  book;  in  Binet-Sangle’s  work,  II  5ff. 


THE  SOURCES 


129 


ner,  for,  if  the  liberals  by  their  attempt  to  construe  the  con¬ 
sciousness  of  Jesus  in  purely  human  terms  have  prepared  the 
way  for  the  questioning  of  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus,  the  con¬ 
servatives  have  made  possible  a  definite  diagnosis  of  paranoia 
by  the  retention  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  as  an  historical  source 
of  information  concerning  what  Jesus  said  and  did.  Binet- 
Sangle  openly  calls  the  Fourth  Gospel  la  biographie  du  declin 
(III  114).  It  is  only  by  the  rejection  of  most  of  the  Johannine 
words,  and  some  of  the  Johannine  acts,  of  Jesus  that  his  psy¬ 
chic  soundness  can  be  saved. 

Hollmann  writes,  the  picture  would  be  changed  in  many 
respects  if  the  Fourth  Gospel  were  excluded  (S.  274). 

Schweitzer  writes,  the  exclusion  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  of 
the  greatest  importance.  This  source  alone  enables  the  path- 
ographers  to  assume  that  we  can  trace  the  development  of  the 
mind  of  Jesus  through  a  period  of  three  years;  it  alone  permits 
them  to  delineate  a  personality  that  was  constantly  occupied 
with  its  own  ego ,  that  sets  it  in  the  foreground  of  all  its  dis¬ 
courses,  that  claims  for  itself  divine  descent  and  demanded  a 
corresponding  belief  on  part  of  the  hearers  (PBJ,  S.  24). 

Even  the  most  casual  reader  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  must 
have  the  impression  that  here  Jesus’  words  are  exclusively  ego¬ 
centric.  The  word  “I”  occurs  six  times  as  often  in  this  Gospel 
as  in  the  Gospel  of  Mt.  The  seven  I  ams  of  Jesus  are  found 
only  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  (6,35  48  51  ;  8,12 ;  10,7  9  ;  10,11  14 ; 
11,25  ;  14,6 ;  15,1).  The  kingdom  of  God,  the  permanent  theme 
of  Jesus’  message  and  teaching  in  the  Synoptics,  has  disap¬ 
peared,  except  in  3.3  5.  In  the  Synoptics  we  see  Jesus  ab¬ 
sorbed  in  the  great  cause  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  but  in  the 
Fourth  Gospel  he  is  engrossed  in  his  own  ego.  Except  for  8,7 
the  pointed  and  piercing  replies  of  Jesus  are  gone.  The  short 
pithy,  pregnant,  sententious  utterances  are  displaced  by  long 
drawn-out  pointless  discourses  about  his  own  person  and  his 
relation  to  his  Father.  Dialogues  drift  off  into  monologues 
and  we  know  no  longer  who  is  speaking  (3,llff ;  3,31ff).  Ex¬ 
cept  for  a  very  few  instances  like  12,24f ;  13,16;  15,20  and 
16,21  the  Johannine  words  of  Jesus  have  no  parallels  in  the 
Synoptics.  The  parables,  the  characteristic  form  of  Jesus’  ad- 


130 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


dress  in  the  first  three  Gospels,  are  missing  or  have  degenerated 
into  unclear  allegory  (10, Iff ;  15, Iff),  the  theme  of  which  is 
not  the  kingdom  of  God  but  the  indispensability  of  the  position 
of  the  person  of  Jesus  in  the  scheme  of  salvation.  The  con¬ 
sciousness  of  his  identit}',  which  is  gained  only  by  personal 
struggle  in  the  Synoptics  and  once  gained  is  most  carefully 
guarded  by  him  and  revealed  at  Caesarea  Philippi  only  to  his 
most  intimate  disciples  and  only  a  few  hours  before  his  death 
to  the  Jerusalem  authorities,  Jesus  possesses  in  the  Fourth  Gos¬ 
pel  from  the  very  beginning.  It  is  never  problematic  for  him¬ 
self.  He  makes  no  effort  to  conceal  his  identity  and  employs 
no  circumlocutions  in  the  Synoptic  sense.  The  Baptist  recog¬ 
nizes  him  and  announces  his  identity  to  the  public.  His  dis¬ 
ciples  know  who  he  is  from  the  very  start;  it  is  this  knowledge 
that  wins  them.  Instead  of  guarding  his  secret  he  discloses  it 
freely  to  the  wanton  woman  at  the  well  (-1,26  Messiah),  to  the 
blind  beggar  to  whom  he  has  restored  sight  (9.37  Son  of  man), 
and  to  his  enemies  (10,36  Son  of  God).  The  points  of  Jesus’ 
contentions  with  his  enemies  are  no  longer  questions  of  the 
Jewish  law,  except  incidentally  (5,16;  7,22f ;  9,11),  but  dis¬ 
putes  regarding  Jesus’  claims  for  himself.  In  the  Sjmoptics 
Jesus  does  not  directly  identify  himself  with  the  Son  of  man, 
but  he  does  freely  and  frequently  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  (3,13 
11;  6,27  53,  62;  12,31),  however,  no  longer  in  the  apocalyptic 
but  in  the  Christian  sense.  In  the  Synoptics  it  is  surprising 
that  Jesus  has  so  little  to  say  of  himself.  The  conditions  for 
entrance  into  the  kingdom  of  God  are  moral  and  ethical,  but 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel  Jesus  is  represented  as  setting  purely  ego¬ 
centric  stipulations.  In  the  Sjmoptics  all  emphasis  is  laid  upon 
the  doing  of  the  will  of  God,  and  what  Jesus  means  by  this  is 
sun-clear;  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  Jesus  never  explains  what  he 
means  by  it,  although  he  speaks  repeatedly  of  doing  God’s  will. 

In  the  Fourth  Gospel  the  moral  motive  for  miracle  has 
disappeared.  Jesus  no  longer  heals  and  cures  out  of  sym¬ 
pathy,  pity,  and  compassion.  The  desire  to  help  has  degen¬ 
erated  into  a  desire  to  arouse  belief  in  the  divine  dignity  of 
his  own  person.  Jesus’  words  to  his  disciples  concerning  the 
affliction  of  the  man  born  blind  (9,3)  and  the  death  of  Lazarus 


THE  SOURCES 


131 


(11,4  15)  are  expressions  of  a  morbid  heartlessness  that  con¬ 
tradicts  all  that  the  Synoptics  tell  us  of  his  character.  Faith 
is  no  longer  the  prerequisite  of  the  cure  but  the  result.  Faith 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  no  longer  the  confident  personal  faith 
of  the  Synoptics,  but  a  cold  confessional  faith  or  belief.  The 
miracles  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  are  signs  (2,11  »  4,54;  6,2;  6,14; 
6,26 ;  9,16;  12,37;  20,30)  and  proofs  that  would  compel  con¬ 
fession.  Without  realizing  the  terrible  indictment  that  he 
brings  down  upon  the  Johannine  miracles  Kneib  writes,  It  con¬ 
tradicts  the  dignity  of  faith  as  well  as  the  dignity  of  the  mir¬ 
acle-worker  to  compel  belief  (S.  28). 

It  is  upon  the  above  enumerated  egocentric  elements  in  the 
Fourth  Gospel  that  de  Loosten,  Binet-Sangle,  and  Hirsch  base, 
for  the  most  part,  their  diagnosis  of  paranoia.  Here  we  can¬ 
not  help  being  reminded  of  a  statement  of  Strauss  in  his  1864 
Leben  Jesn  to  the  effect  that  whoever  ascribes  to  Jesus  the  ego¬ 
centric  words  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  renders  him  a  perilous  serv¬ 
ice  (see  above  p.  5f). 

Further  when  we  read  Jn  5,19;  8,19  29;  10,38;  14,23c; 
17,21  we  cannot  but  think  of  those  cases  of  double  or  coexistent 
personality  of  which  Ribot  writes:  In  demented  subjects  the 
disorganization  is  organized :  they  are  double ,  believe  them¬ 
selves  double  and  act  as  double  personalities.  There  is  not  the 

least  doubt  about  it  in  their  minds . To  them  it  seems  as 

natural  to  be  double ,  as  to  us  it  does  to  be  single.  There  is  no 
scepticism  on  their  part  as  regards  their  state,  nor  do  they 
tolerate  it  in  others.  Their  mode  of  existence,  given  to  them 
by  their  consciousness,  appears  to  them  so  clear  and  evident  as 
to  be  above  all  doubt,  or  the  supposition  of  it.  It  is  important 
to  note  this  point,  because  it  proves,  in  these  morbid  forms  of 
personality,  that  spontaneity  of  affirmation  and  action  which 
is  characteristic  of  all  natural  states  (DP,  p.  127). 

As  stated  above,  it  is  not  our  purpose  here  to  make  a 
complete  catalogue  of  the  historical  and  critical  objections  to 
the  historicity  of  Jesus’  words,  either  in  their  form  or  content, 
as  found  in  the  Fourth  Gospel.  It  is  further  not  our  intention 
to  discuss  the  character  and  purpose  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  as 
a  whole.  For  such  a  treatise  the  writer  would  refer  the  reader 


132 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


to  Wrede’s  pamphlet,  Charakter  und  Tendenz  des  Johannes- 
evangeliwns,  which  in  spite  of  its  brevity,  is  the  best  general 
characterization  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  that  has  appeared  in  the 
recent  life-of- Jesus  research. 

Our  present  purpose  is  to  show  that  the  egocentric  words 
placed  in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  are  not 
words  of  Jesus  at  all,  but  really  the  christocentric  confessions 
of  the  fourth  evangelist.  And  as  such  they  cannot  be  used  as 
pathographic  matter  for  the  diagnosis  of  paranoia.  Strauss 
wrote  that  the  words  of  Jesus  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  are  merely 
an  uninterrupted  Doxology ,  only  translated  out  of  the  second 
person  into  the  first  (see  above  p.  5).  Strauss  would  have  been 
nearer  the  truth  had  he  made  it  from  the  third  to  the  first 
person. 

In  the  Fourth  Gospel  we  do  not  hear  Jesus  speaking,  but 
we  hear  the  early  Christian  preacher  addressing  the  early  Chris¬ 
tian  community,  or  at  times  those  who  do  not  believe,  or  even 
those  who  oppose  the  Christian  faith  (3,11;  1,22;  5,38).  For 
the  convenience  of  making  this  point  and  position  clear  the  dis¬ 
course  material  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  divided  into  three 
groups:  1)  those  passages  in  which  the  author  is  directly  ad¬ 
dressing  himself  to  his  readers;  2)  those  passages  in  which  the 
words  and  thoughts  of  the  early  Christian  preacher  are  put  in¬ 
to  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  the  second  and  third  person;  3)  those 
passages  in  which  the  words  and  thoughts  of  the  early  Christian 
preacher  are  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  the  first  person. 

1)  To  this  group  belong  such  passages  as  follow.  1,16 
For  of  his  fullness  we  all  received,  and  grace  for  grace.  8,32 
Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the  truth  shall  make  you  free. 
9,4  We  must  work  the  works  of  him  that  sent  HIM,  while  it  is 
day:  the  night  cometh  when  no  man  can  work.  In  these  pas¬ 
sages,  as  well  as  in  6,27 ;  19,35-37,  etc.,  we  hear  the  early 
Christian  preacher  directly  addressing  himself  to  the  early 
Christian  community  in  the  first  and  second  persons. 

In  the  following  passages  we  hear  this  early  Christian 
preacher  addressing  the  early  Christian  community  in  the  third 
person.  3,14-16  For  as  Moses  lifted  up  the  serpent  in  the  wild¬ 
erness,  even  so  must  the  Son  of  man  he  lifted  up;  that  whosoever 


THE  SOURCES 


133 


believeth  may  in  him  have  eternal  life.  For  God  so  loved  the 
world ,  that  he  gave  his  only  begotten  Son,  that  whosoever  be¬ 
lieveth  on  him  should  not  perish,  but  have  eternal  life.  6,10 
For  this  is  the  will  of  the  Father,  that  everyone  that  behold- 
eth  the  Son,  and  believeth  on  him,  should  have  eternal  life.  7,18 
He  that  speaketh  from  himself  seeketh  his  own  glory:  but  he 
that  seeketh  the  glory  of  him  that  sent  him,  the  same  is  true, 
and  no  unrighteousness  is  in  him.  15,13  Greater  love  hath  no 
man  than  this,  that  a  man  lay  down  his  life  for  his  friends. 
The  same  is  true  of  1,1-5  ;  1,9-11 ;  3,31-36 ;  6,58 ;  20,30-31 ;  etc. 

2)  This  group  divides  itself  into  two  sub-groups,  a) 
Those  words  of  the  early  Christian  preacher  addressed  to  the 
early  Christian  community  in  the  second  person,  but  put  into 
the  mouth  of  Jesus ;  6,29  This  is  the  work  of  God,  that  ye  be¬ 
lieve  on  him  whom  he  hath  sent;  also  5,35  37b-39 ;  12,35-36; 
etc.  b)  Those  words  of  the  early  Christian  preacher  ad¬ 
dressed  to  the  early  Christian  community  in  the  third  person, 
but  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus;  10,1-5  Verily,  verily,  I  say 
unto  you ,  He  that  entereth  not  by  the  door  into  the  fold  of  the 
sheep ,  but  climbeth  up  some  other  way,  the  same  is  a  thief  and 
a  robber.  But  he  that  entereth  in  by  the  door  is  the  shepherd 
of  the  sheep.  To  him  the  porter  openeth;  and  the  sheep  hear 
his  voice:  and  he  calletli  his  own  sheep  by  name  and  leadeth 
them  out.  When  he  hath  put  forth  all  his  own,  he  goeth  before 
them,  and  the  sheep  follow  him:  for  they  know  his  voice.  And 
a  stranger  will  they  not  follow,  but  will  flee  from  him:  for 
they  know  not  the  voice  of  strangers;  also  5,19-23;  5,25-29; 
10,llb-13;  11,9-10;  13,31-32;  16,2;  etc. 

3)  This  group  includes  the  greater  portion  of  the  dis¬ 
course  material  in  the  Fourth  Gospel:  5,13  16-17;  6,18-51  55- 
57;  7,16-17  37-38;  8,31  12  51;  10,7b-lla  11-18  27-30  37-38; 
12,32  11-50;  13,13-15;  11,1-1  6-7  11-21  25-27;  15,1-12  11-27; 
16,1  3-6  7b-15  23-21  27-28  33;  17,1-2  1-26;  18,37b;  19, 
11 ;  all  the  I  ams.  All  the  above  words  the  fourth  evangelist 
puts  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  the  first  person.  Why  he  has 
done  this  we  do  not  know.  It  is  doubtless  the  fact  that  Jesus 
has  so  little  to  say  of  himself  and  the  identity  of  his  person  in 
the  Synoptics  that  has  prompted  the  fourth  evangelist  to  con- 


134 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


vert  these  early  Christian  convictions  and  confessions  into  words 
of  Jesus  in  the  first  person.  It  is  perhaps  an  attempt  to  bridge 
over  the  gap  that  existed  between  what  Jesus  actually  claimed 
for  himself  and  what  the  early  Christian  community  and  its 
faith  claimed  for  him. 

A  concrete  confirmation  of  this  change  from  the  third  to  the 
first  person  by  the  a  uthor  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  seen  in  the 
Johannine  account  of  the  baptism  of  Jesus,  1,32-34,  where  the 
whole  narrative  of  the  Synoptic  scene  at  the  Jordan  is  put  into 
the  mouth  of  the  Baptist  in  the  form  of  a  confession  in  the  first 
person. 

That  these  egocentric  words  ascribed  to  Jesus  in  the 
Fourth  Gospel  are  only  early  Christian  convictions  and  con¬ 
fessions,  originally  in  the  third  person,  set  in  the  first  person  in 
the  mouth  of  Jesus  is  clear  from  the  ease  with  which  they  can 
be  reset  from  the  first  into  the  third  person.  The  I  ams  are  not 
words  of  the  historical  Jesus,  but  earlv  Christian  convictions 
and  confessions  of  faith  put  into  his  mouth  to  augment  their 
authority.  They  should  read  in  the  third  person :  HE  is  the 
bread  of  life;  he  that  cometh  unto  HIM  shall  not  hunger ,  and 
he  that  believeth  on  HIM  shall  never  thirst  (6,35).  HE  is  the 
light  of  the  world;  he  that  followeth  HIM  shall  not  walk  in 
darkness ,  but  shall  have  the  light  of  life  (8,12).  HE  is  the 
door;  by  HIM  if  any  man  enter  in,  he  shall  be  saved,  etc.  (10,9). 
HE  is  the  good  shepherd ;  the  good  shepherd  layeth  down  his 
life  for  his  sheep  (10,11).  HE  is  the  resurrection,  and  the  life; 
he  that  believeth  on  HIM,  though  he  die,  yet  shall  he  live;  and 
whosoever  livetli  and  believeth  on  HIM  shall  never  die  (11,25- 
26).  HE  is  the  way,  and  the  truth,  and  the  life;  no  one  cometh 
unto  the  Father,  but  by  HIM  (14,6).  HE  is  the  vine,  WE  are 
the  branches  (15,5). 

Thus  all  the  words  ascribed  to  Jesus  by  the  fourth  evang¬ 
elist  in  this  group  can  be  readily  reset  into  the  third  person, 
which  resetting  makes  them  historically  understandable.  The 
farewell  prayer,  17,1-26,  is  to  be  understood  only  as  a  prayer 
of  this  early  Christian  preacher  as  verse  three  clearly  betrays, 
And  this  is  life  eternal,  that  they  should  know  the  only  true 
God ,  and  him  whom  thou  didst  send,  even  Jesus  Christ;  only 


THE  SOURCES 


135 


historical  violence  can  ascribe  this  word  to  Jesus.  In  10,10b 
we  hear  the  early  Christian  preacher  addressing  his  hearers : 
HE  came  that  WE  may  have  life ,  and  may  have  it  abundantly. 
All  of  these  egocentric  words  ascribed  to  Jesus  in  the  first  per¬ 
son  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  should  read  in  the  same  person  as  that 
great  verse  in  which  is  concentrated  and  crystalized  all  that  is 
essential  in  Christian  confession,  Jn  3,16,  For  God  so  loved  the 
world ,  that  he  gave  his  only  begotten  Son,  that  whosoever  be - 
lievetli  on  him  should  not  perish,  but  have  eternal  life.  Does 
this  chief  of  all  Christian  confessions  lose  any  of  its  force  or 
appeal  because  it  stands  in  the  third  person  and  has  not  been 
converted  into  the  first  person  and  set  on  the  lips  of  Jesus  to 
read,  For  God  so  loved  the  world,  that  he  gave  ME,  his  only 
begotten  Son,  that  whosoever  believeth  on  ME  should  not  perish , 
but  have  eternal  life?  Not  in  the  least.  Such  is  the  case  with 
all  the  egocentric  words  of  Jesus,  particularly  in  the  first  per¬ 
son,  in  the  Fourth  Gospel.  We  understand  them  only  when  they 
come  from  the  heart  of  this  great  disciple  of  Christ  who  wrote 
the  Fourth  Gospel,  and  not  from  the  lips  of  Jesus.  It  is  the 
stipulation  of  this  source  that  accounts  for  the  popularity  and 
appeal  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  to  personal  Christian  piety  down 
through  more  than  eighteen  centuries. 

One  of  the  greatest  misunderstandings  in  the  critical  re¬ 
search  of  the  Gospel  literature  has  been  the  notion  that  the  re¬ 
jection  of  Johannine  words  of  Jesus  as  historical  means  the 
complete  rejection  of  the  Fourth  Gospel.  As  Wrede  has  pointed 
out,  the  work  of  the  fourth  evangelist  is  one  of  the  most 
significant  and  remarkable  documents  of  primitive  Christianity. 
The  Fourth  Gospel  is  the  greatest  of  all  Christian  confessions. 
It  is  its  confessional  character  that  has  won  for  it  the  chief  seat 
in  the  Christian  conscience  and  consciousness.  This  view  brings 
the  Fourth  Gospel  into  that  great  group  of  the  confessional 
literature  of  Christianity  which  has  always  meant  the  most  to 
personal  Christian  faith.  Here  it  rightly  belongs.  Here  it 
occupies  a  place  second  to  none. 

We  must  remind  ourselves  constantly  that  historically  the 
Gospels  contain  vastly  more  of  what  others  thought  about 
Jesus  than  what  he  thought  about  himself.  Regarding  the  first 


136 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


we  are  quite  sure.  Regarding  the  second  we  have  only  confu¬ 
sion  and  controversy. 

We  must  further  keep  in  mind  that  the  thought  and  re¬ 
ligion  of  the  early  Christian  community  were  distinctly  and  de¬ 
cidedly  christocentric.  This  should  help  to  the  realization  that 
the  resetting  of  die  egocentric  words  of  Jesus  in  the  Fourth 
Gospel  into  christocentric  confessions  and  convictions  on  the 
lips  of  a  beloved  disciple  is  our  gain  and  not  our  loss.  Why 
read  them  as  words  on  the  lips  of  Jesus  when  they  do  not  belong 
there,  and  when  they  mean  much  more  on  the  lips  of  an  early 
Christian  disciple,  perhaps  an  eye-  and  ear-witness  of  Jesus’ 
public  career?  That  any  early  Christian  disciple,  whether  or 
not  he  had  seen  and  heard  Jesus  as  a  man  among  men  yet  who 
stood  historically  at  most  but  a  few  decades  removed,  could 
confess  such  things  wTith  such  conviction  as  the  author  of  the 
Fourth  Gospel  confesses  about  Jesus  still  awaits  its  parallel  in 
esteem  accorded  to  any  person  of  history. 

From  the  viewpoint  of  historical  criticism  vre  can  put  the 
Fourth  Gospel  on  a  parity  with  Paul’s  epistles,  which  are  not 
the  less  valuable  because  we  cannot  reconstruct  a  little  life  of 
Jesus  from  them  as  Renan  thought  he  could.  The  early  Chris¬ 
tian  confessions  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  are  even  more  exposed 
and  accessible  to  the  average  Bible  reader  than  are  the  epistles 
of  Paul.  For  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  free  from  the  abstract  the¬ 
ological  phraseology  and  complications  found  in  Paul’s  letters, 
and  from  the  Fourth  Gospel  radiates  constantly  a  magnetic 
mysticism  and  glowing  warmth  of  faith  that  are  only  occasional 
in  Paul. 

2)  The  Synoptics 
A)  Discourse  Matter 

From  the  viewpoint  of  the  pathographic  contention  the 
Synoptic  materials  fall  into  two  main  groups:  A)  Discourse 
Matter;  and  B)  Biographical  Incidents.  The  biographical  in¬ 
cidents  are  listed  and  discussed  in  the  last  part  of  the  present 
chapter.  The  discourse  matter  falls  into  three  classes :  a  )  Ego- 
centric  Words  of  Jesus;  b)  Eschatological  Elements;  c)  Social 
Teachings.  We  begin  wdth 


THE  SOURCES 


137 


a)  Egocentric  Words  of  Jesus  in  the  Synoptics, 
i)  In  the  preceding  pages  we  have  discussed  the  egocen¬ 
tric  words  of  Jesus  as  found  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  and  it  is  our 
first  duty  here  to  search  out  any  words  of  Jesus  in  the  first 
three  Gospels  that  have  a  clear  Johannine  character.  In  this 
search  we  are  not  disappointed,  for  we  find  two  such  instances; 

the  first  is  found  in  both  Me  and  Q,  the  second  in  Q  only. 

Me  9,37b  Whosoever  receiveth  me,  receiveth  not  me,  but 

Lc  9,48b  Whosoever  shall  receive  me  receiveth 

him  that  sent  me.  Mt  10,40  He  that  receiveth  you  receiveth  me, 

him  that  sent  me.  Lc  10,16  He  that  rejecteth  you  rejecteth  me; 

and  he  that  receiveth  me  receiveth  him  that  sent  me. 
and  he  that  rejecteth  me  rejecteth  him  that  sent  me. 

The  specially  Johannine  feature  of  these  words  is  the  idea 
of  Jesus  being  sent,  and  that  the  reception  or  rejection  of  him 
is  identical  with  the  reception  or  rejection  of  him  that  sent  him. 
Me  9,37b  and  Lc  9,18b  is  a  word  of  Jesus  spoken  in  connection 
with  his  setting  a  little  child  in  the  midst  of  the  disciples. 
Mt  10,10  and  Lc  10,16  are  from  Q;  both  cite  this  word  as 
addressed  to  the  disciples  on  sending  them  out,  but  in  Mt  it  is 
to  the  twelve,  in  Lc  to  the  seventy.  Mt  and  Lc  are  identical 
in  thought,  but  manifest  their  characteristic  difference  in  the 
choice  of  vocabulary  in  their  reproductions  of  Q  (Compare 
Mt  10,37  and  Lc  11,26). 

Mt  11,27  All  things  have  been  delivered  unto  me  of  my  Father 

Lc  10,22  Ail  things  have  been  delivered  unto  me  of  my  Father 

and  no  one  knoweth  the  Son  save  the  Father;  neither  doth 

and  no  one  knoweth  who  the  Son  is,  save  the  Father;  and 

any  know  the  Father,  save  the  Son,  and  he  to  whomsoever  the  Son 

who  the  Father  is,  save  the  Son,  and  he  to  whomsoever  the  Son 

willeth  to  reveal  him. 
willeth  to  reveal  him. 

Both  the  language  and  thought  of  this  passage  are  Johan¬ 
nine  and  are  without  other  Stmoptic  parallels  (See  Mt  28,18b). 
“Me”  and  “my”  should  be  changed  to  read  “him”  and  “his” 
in  order  to  fit  in  with  the  third  person  of  the  second  half  of 
the  passage,  for  it  is  simply  an  early  Christian  confession  set 
in  the  mouth  of  Jesus  in  the  first  person.  Mt  11,27  and  Lc 
10,22  have  been  commonly  regarded  as  the  conclusion  of  Jesus’ 
acclamation,  or  prayer,  in  Mt  11,25-26  and  Lc  10,21,  but 
Jesus’  acclamation  proper  is  confined  to  Mt  25-26  and  Lc  21. 
These  verses  express  a  completed  thought  and  have  no  essen- 


138 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


tial  connection  with  Mt  11,27  and  Lc  10,22.  Jesus’  acclama¬ 
tion  in  Mt  25-26  and  Lc  21  is  simply  a  figurative  address,  in 
no  sense  Johannine,  confirmed  by  Jesus’  actual  experiences  of 
success  and  failure  with  the  various  classes  of  his  contempo¬ 
raries. 

In  the  above  cited  passages  we  discover  slight  Johannine 
invasions  of  Synoptic  matter,  one  of  Me  and  two  of  Q.  This 
is  not  at  all  surprising.  The  surprising  fact  is  that  the  Johan¬ 
nine  invasions  of  Synoptic  matter  are  not  more  extensive. 
Those  who  cannot  find  a  single  reliable  historical  datum  in  the 
Fourth  Gospel,  nor  a  single  Johannine  expression  in  the  first 
three  Gospels,  draw  a  hard  and  fast  line  that  does  not  exist 
in  the  sources  themselves.  The  New  Testament  canon  cannot 
be  treated  so  mechanically,  for  the  Gospel  literature  sprang 
too  vitally  and  organically  out  of  the  life  and  faith  of  the  early 
Christian  community.  The  distinction  between  the  Fourth  Gos¬ 
pel  and  the  Synoptics  is  modern,  a  nineteenth  century  distinc¬ 
tion  dating  from  Strauss.  Such  a  distinction  never  occurred 
to  the  Gospel  writers.  As  Wrede  says  of  the  fourth  evangel¬ 
ist,  Wie  der  vergleichende  Kritiker  von  heute  hat  er  ja  dock  den 
Unterschied  seiner  Erzaehlung  von  der  der  andern  nicht  gemes- 
sen  (CuTdJE,  S.  70). 

ii)  We  come  now  to  those  egocentric  words  of  Jesus  in 
the  Synoptics  which  are  not  Johannine  in  character,  but  reflect 
rather  the  conceptions  and  convictions  of  the  early  Christian 
faith  concerning  the  significance  of  Jesus’  person.  For  the 
most  part,  these  words  are  distinguished  by  the  expressions 
for  my  sake ,  for  my  name's  sake ,  because  of  me,  etc. 

We  notice  first  those  passages  found  in  Me,  many  of  them 

also  in  Q,  and  reproduced  by  either  Mt  or  Lc,  or  both. 

Mt  16,24  If  any  man  would  come  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself, 

Me  8,34  If  any  man  would  come  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself, 

Lc  9,23  If  any  man  would  come  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself, 

and  take  up  his  cross,  and  follow  me. 

and  take  up  his  cross,  and  follow  me. 

and  take  up  his  cross  daily,  and  follow  me. 

Mt  10,38  And  he  that  doth  not  take  his  cross,  and  follow  after 

Lc  14,27  Whosoever  doth  not  bear  his  own  cross,  and  come  after 

me,  is  not  worthy  of  me. 
me,  cannot  be  my  disciple. 


THE  SOURCES 


139 


This  word  ascribed  to  Jesus  is  a  doublet  in  both  Mt  and 
Lc.  It  is  written  in  the  light  of  the  death  of  Jesus  on  the 

cross,  and  is  a  metaphor  of  early  Christian  homiletics  rather 

than  a  real  word  of  Jesus.  If  it  does  go  back  to  Jesus  at  all, 
its  present  form  was  given  it  by  the  early  Christian  commun¬ 
ity  when  the  cross  had  become  the  common  Christian  symbol 
(Compare  Wellhausen,  Marci,  S.  66;  J.  Weiss,  SdNT,  I  151). 
Besides  Me  is  grouping  topically  here,  for  he  introduces  this 

word  immediately  after  the  first  prophecy  of  the  passion. 

Mt  16,25  For  whosoever  would  save  his  life  shall  lose  it;  and  who- 

Mc  8,35  For  whosoever  would  save  his  life  shall  lose  it;  and  who- 

Lc  9,2-1  For  whosoever  would  save  his  life  shall  lose  it;  but  who¬ 
soever  shall  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  shall 

soever  shall  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  and  the  gospel’s  shall 

soever  shall  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  the  same  shall 

find  it. 
save  it. 
save  it. 

Mt  10,39  He  that  findeth  his  life  shall  lose  it;  and 

Lc  17,33  Whosoever  shall  seek  to  gain  his  life  shall  lose  it;  but 

he  that  loseth  his  life  for  my  sake  shall  find  it. 

whosoever  shall  lose  his  life  shall  preserve  it. 

Lc  17,33  preserves  the  more  original  form  of  this  word 

of  Jesus.  Its  form  in  Jn  12,25  confirms  this.  “For  my  sake,” 

ipou  xerf,  is  missing  in  D  a  b  i  (k)  sys  arm  aeth  Or  texts  of 

Me  8,35,  (Huck,  S.  101). 

Me  8,38  For  whosoever  shall  be  ashamed  of  me  and  my  words  in 

Lc  9,26  For  whosoever  shall  be  ashamed  of  me  and  my  words 

this  adulterous  and  sinful  generation,  the  Son  of  man  also  shall  be 

of  him  shall  the  Son  of 

ashamed  of  him. 
man  be  ashamed, 

Mt  10,33  But  whosoever  shall  deny  me  before  men, 

Lc  12,9  But  he  that  denieth  me  in  the  presence  of  men 

him  wall  I  also  deny  before  my  Father  who  is  in 

shall  be  denied  in  the  presence  of  the  angels  of  God. 
heaven. 

Mt  10,33  completes  the  identification  of  Jesus  with  the 
Son  of  man,  and  is  therefore  christianized  and  less  original 
than  the  single  form  in  Me  and  the  double  form  in  Lc,  where 
this  word  is  less  egocentric  and  the  supernatural  role  is  ascribed 
to  the  unidentified  Son  of  man.  Wellhausen  writes,  This  utter¬ 
ance  is  out  of  the  same  metal  as  8,35  hut  it  is  of  a  different 
stamp.  The  demand  is  hy  no  means  so  extreme;  “7  and  my 
words ”  is  something  entirely  different  from  “7  and  the  gospel ” 
(Marci,  S.  67).  Me  8,38a  is  more  in  the  tone  and  theme  of 


140 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Me  13,81  (=Mt  24,35=Lc  21,33),  words  which  no  one  is  will¬ 
ing  to  take  from  the  mouth  of  Jesus. 

Mt  18,5  Whoso  shall  receive  one  such  little  child  .  in  my 

Me  9,37  Whosoever  shall  receive  one  of  such  little  children  in  my 

Lc  9,48  Whosoever  shall  receive  this  little  child  in  my 

name  receiveth  me. 
name,  receiveth  me. 
name  receiveth  me. 

lit  18,3  Except  ye  turn,  and  become 

Me  10,15  Whosoever  shall  not  receive  the 

Lc  18,17  Whosoever  shall  not  receive  the 

as  little  children  ye  shall  in  no  wise  enter  into  the 

kingdom  of  God  as  a  little  child,  he  shall  in  no  wise  enter 

kingdom  of  God  as  a  little  child,  he  shall  in  no  wise  enter 

kingdom  of  heaven, 
therein, 
therein. 

The  original  form  of  Me  9,37  and  parallels  is  to  be  found 
in  Me  10,15  and  parallels.  Here  the  child  represents  that 
model  of  modest  mentality  to  which  alone  is  destined  the  par¬ 
ticipation  in  the  kingdom  of  God.  But  in  Me  9,37  and  paral¬ 
lels  this  conception  is  christianized,  and  the  child  as  such  is 
Jesus’  personal  representative  on  earth  and  the  objective  oc¬ 
casion  by  which  loyalty  to  his  person  is  tested.  The  original 
meaning  is  still  retained  in  the  preceding  verses,  Me  10,14= 
Mt  19,14=Lc  18,16  (Compare  Mt  18,10;  18,14;  Lc  15,7). 
A  still  further  elaboration  of  this  thought  is  found  in  Mt  18,6 
and  Me  9,42  where  “the  little  ones”  are  no  longer  real  children, 
but  disciples  who  believe  on  Jesus.  Lc  17,1-2  is  the  more  orig¬ 
inal  form  of  this  word;  here  there  is  no  reference  to  “the  little 
ones  who  believe  on  me.”  Many  texts  of  Me  9,42  omit  “on  me”  ; 
eig  eps  is  found  in  A  B  L  0  2  ...  min  c  f  1  q  vg  sys  vg  sa 
arm  go  (Huck,  S.  110).  Nestle  omits  it,  as  do  Westcott  and 
Hort. 

Mt  10,42  And  whosoever  shall  give  to  drink  unto  one  of  these 
Me  9,41  For  whosoever  shall  give  you 

little  ones  a  cup  of  cold  water  only  in  the  name  of  a  disciple, 

a  cup  of  water  to  drink  because  ye  are  Christ’s, 

verily  I  say  unto  you,  he  shall  in  no  wise  lose  his  reward, 

verily  I  say  unto  you,  he  shall  in  no  wise  lose  his  reward. 

Some  ancient  authorities  add  “in  my  name”  after  “water” 

in  Me  9,41.  Tischendorf  retains  this  expression  in  its  full 
form.  Nestle  omits  pou,  as  do  Westcott  and  Hort.  pou  is 
found  in  Aleph*  D  X  A  0  .  .  .  .  .  min  lat  bo  aeth  go ;  it  is  missing 
A  B  C  L  2  1  238  435  579 . sy  arm  (Huck,  110). 


THE  SOURCES 


141 


The  omission  of  “my”  results  in  the  English  translation  “be¬ 
cause”  (“in  name  that  ye  are”).  Mt  cites  this  word  as  the 
conclusion  of  the  address  to  the  twelve.  Me  cites  it  in  con¬ 
nection  with  a  reminiscence  by  the  disciple  John  of  an  incident 
doubtless  experienced  during  the  mission  of  the  twelve.  In 

Me  “the  little  ones”  are  not  only  disciples  but  the  twelve. 

Mt  19,29  And  every  one  that  hath  left  houses,  or 

Me  10,29  There  is  no  man  that  hath  left  house,  or 

Lc  18,29  There  is  no  man  that  hath  left  house,  or  wife,  or 

brethren,  or  sisters,  or  father,  or  mother,  or  children,  or  lands,  for  my 

brethren,  or  sisters,  or  mother,  or  father,  or  children,  or  lands,  for  my 

brethren,  or  parents,  or  children, 

name's  sake, 

sake,  and  for  the  gospel's  sake, 

for  the  kingdom  of  God's  sake, 

Lc’s  conclusion  in  18,29  is  unquestionably  the  more  orig¬ 
inal  form,  for  it  corresponds  most  closely  to  what  wTas  central 
in  Jesus’  thought  and  message.  Roth  Mt  and  Me  present  the 
early  Christian  point  of  view  regarding  sacrifice  rather  than 
that  of  Jesus. 

Me  13,9  (“for  my  sake”)  and  Lc  21,12  (“for  my  name’s 
sake”)  are  a  part  of  Jesus’  eschatological  address.  Mt  omits 
the  egocentric  conclusion  in  this  connection,  but  unadvisedly 
reproduces  this  verse  of  Me  in  the  address  to  the  twelve  (Mt 
10,17-18)  and  closes  with  “for  my  sake.”  That  we  have  in 
Me  13  perhaps  the  only  written  source  of  the  second  Gospel 
which  was  circulated  at  a  very  early  date  as  an  apocalyptic 
fly-leaf  (thus  Wernle,  SF,  S.  213)  is  very  probable,  but  that 
before  or  with  its  incorporation  in  Me  it  has  undergone  a 
change  and  thorough  revision  is  clear  from  the  following  verse 
(Me  13,10)  which  breaks  off  the  eschatological  point  of  the 
address  itself.  The  original  address  centered  upon  the  great 
cosmic  catastrophe  and  the  sudden  appearance  of  the  uniden¬ 
tified  Son  of  man.  If  the  man  on  the  housetop  has  not  time 
enough  to  go  down,  nor  the  man  in  the  field  to  return  for  his 
cloak,  how  shall  the  disciples  ever  be  delivered  up  to  councils, 
beaten  in  synagogues,  or  stand  before  governors  and  kings,  to 
say  nothing  of  preaching  the  gospel  to  all  nations?  Me  13,9 
(=Lc  21,12)  and  13,13  (=Mt  24,9b;  10,22a=Lc  21,17),  as 
well  as  13,10  (Mt  24,14),  are  written  in  the  light  of  already 
experienced  persecutions  and  the  delay  of  the  parousia. 


142 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


We  now  turn  to  one  or  two  egocentric  words  of  Jesus  not 

found  in  Me  but  common  to  Mt  and  Lc,  peculiar  to  Q. 

Mt  5,11  Blessed  are  ye  when  men  shall  reproach  you . 

Lc  6,22  Blessed  are  ye,  when  men  shall . reproach  you . 

for  my  sake, 

for  the  Son  of  man’s  sake. 

That  Lc’s  conclusion  in  6,22  is  the  more  original  is  clear 
from  the  fact  that  the  texts  of  the  passage  in  Lc  are  constant 
in  this  reading  while  the  texts  of  Mt  5,11  vary  strongly.  sys  c 
read  “for  my  name’s  sake,”  ton  ovoparo^  [ton;  D  a  b  c  g  k  read 
more  impersonally  “for  righteousness’  sake,”  Sixaioonvr 
wrhich  is  the  logical  continuation  of  the  identical  expression 
in  the  preceding  verse,  Mt  5,10. 

A  second  egocentric  word  from  Q  is  Mt  7,22-23;  here 
Jesus  is  represented  as  anticipating  his  role  as  decider  of  des¬ 
tinies  in  the  final  judgment.  A  glance  at  Lc  13,25-27  shows 
that  Mt’s  word  is  an  early  Christian  corruption  of  this  parable 
where  these  words  belong  in  the  mouth  of  the  “master  of  the 
house.”  The  introduction,  Lc  13,25,  Mt  has  tacked  on  to  his 
parable  of  the  wise  and  foolish  virgins  (Mt  25,1-13),  which 
parable  should  end  with  verse  10.  Juelicher  clamorously  con¬ 
tends  for  the  originality  of  Mt  25,1-10  (GRJ,  S.  458f).  Well- 
hausen  protests  in  favor  of  the  priority  of  Lc  13,25-27  (Matt- 
haei,  S.  122f). 

Mt  10,32  and  Lc  12,8  stood  in  Q  as  a  counterpart  to  Mt 
10,33  and  Lc  12,9.  Mt’s  form  is  much  more  strongly  chris¬ 
tianized  and  confessionalized  than  that  of  Lc. 

To  matter  peculiar  to  Mt  bearing  the  coloring  of  early 
Christian  confession  and  conviction  belongs  11,28-30  which 
contrasts  too  strongly  with  8,18-22  (=Lc  9,57-60)  to  be  pure. 
In  Mt  12,6  the  American  Revised  Version  follows  the  minority 
readings,  (C)  L  A.  13-346-788  118-209.  .lat.  Tischendorf, 
Westcott  and  Hort,  and  Nestle  agree  in  retaining  psl^ov  of 

Aleph,  B  Dgr  0 . min  ff  q  sys  bo  instead  of  pei^cor  of  the 

minority  readings  (Huck,  S.  54).  Mt  18,19-20  is  not  a  word 
of  Jesus  but  an  instance  of  Gemeindetheologie.  In  Mt  23,10, 
not  Jesus,  but  the  author  of  the  first  Gospel  is  speaking. 


The  above  comparisons  of  the  readings  of  the  first  three 


THE  SOURCES 


143 


Gospels  and  various  readings  of  the  same  Gospel  in  its  differ¬ 
ent  texts  and  translations  show  that  Jesus  did  not  set  egocen¬ 
tric  stipulations  for  entrance  into  and  participation  in  the 
kingdom  of  God  as  Binet-Sangle  and  Hirsch  represent.  Such 
expressions  as  for  my  sake,  for  my  name's  sake,  because  of  me, 
etc.,  are  to  be  eliminated,  for  the  most  part,  by  a  comparison 
of  the  first  three  Gospels  or  an  examination  of  the  varying 
texts  of  the  same  Gospel.  In  order  to  correspond  to  what  was 
central  in  the  thought,  teaching  and  preaching  of  Jesus,  these 
egocentric  words  should  read  for  righteousness '  sake,  for  the 
kingdom  of  God's  sake,  for  the  Son  of  man’s  sake,  etc.  In  the 
few  cases  where  the  different  readings  will  not  make  this  pos¬ 
sible  such  expressions  are  to  be  assigned  to  the  thought  and 
theologv  of  the  early  Christian  community,  for  they  represent 
rather  the  significance  attached  to  the  person  of  Jesus  by  the 
early  Christian  community  than  any  significance  which  Jesus 
himself  attached  to  his  own  person.  In  such  passages,  as  Well- 
hausen  says  of  them  in  Me,  Jesus  is  no  longer  the  proclaimer , 
but  the  substance  of  the  gospel  itself  (Marci,  S.  67). 

The  egocentric  expressions,  for  my  sake,  etc.,  are  least  fre¬ 
quent  in  Me  and  most  numerous  in  Mt.  This  frequency  in 
Mt  is  due  to  the  fact  that  Mt  has  strongly  christianized  and 
confessionalized  his  second  source  Q.  That  Mt  has  done  this 
is  clear  from  a  comparison  of  the  first  beatitude  and  the  Lord’s 
Prayer  in  Mt  and  Lc  (Mt  5,3=Lc  6,20;  Mt  6,9ff=Lc  ll,2ff), 
further  by  a  comparison  of  Mt  7,23  and  Lc  13,25-27  ;  Mt  10,33 
and  Lc  12,9.  The  egocentric  words  ascribed  to  Jesus  are  spec¬ 
ially  lacking  in  Lc  which  fact  is  easily  understood  by  his  con¬ 
ception  of  Jesus’  person  in  5,17b  where  he  speaks  of  Jesus’ 
miracle  power  as  an  intermittent  and  inconstant  endowment  and 
equipment;  besides  in  his  peculiar  matter  Lc  regularly  refers 
to  Jesus  as  a  prophet  (See  7,16;  7,39;  24,19).  That  Lc  does 
not  consider  Jesus  as  egocentric  in  his  thought  is  clearest  from 
that  incident  peculiar  to  Lc  in  11,27-28. 

That  these  confessional  conceptions  of  Jesus’  words  are 
more  frequent  in  Q  than  in  Me  is  only  natural  in  view  of  the 
catechetical  principle  and  purpose  of  the  Q  collection  (see 
Wernle,  SF,  S.  227).  Harnack  designates  Q  as  exclusively 


144 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


intended  for  the  use  of  the  early  Christian  community  (SuRJ, 
S.  163).  Castor  even  goes  so  far  as  to  say,  the  conception  of 
Jesus ’  person  here  (in  Q)  is  the  same  that  we  find  in  the  speech 
of  Peter ,  Acts  2, 11-36  (p.  209). 

No  student  of  the  Gospels  can  deny  that  in  them  we  see  Jesus 
only  through  early  Christian  eyes  and  hear  him  speak  only 
through  early  Christian  lips.  The  Synoptics  from  beginning 
to  end  are  permeated  with  the  conceptions,  convictions  and 
confessions  of  the  first  Christians,  and  these  are,  for  the  most 
part,  put  into  the  mouth  of  Jesus.  The  expositions  of  Jesus’ 
parables  (Me  4,13-20=Mt  13,19-23=Lc  8,11-15;  Mt  13,37- 
43  49-50)  are  only  early  Christian  homilies;  they  are  unnec¬ 
essary  for  the  parables  themselves  are  sun-clear.  Lc  is  spec¬ 
ially  homiletic  in  his  presentation  of  Jesus’  preaching;  Mt  tends 
towards  confessionalism  and  ecclesiasticism  (16,17-19;  18,16- 
17).  Even  Me  has  his  theology.  This  Christianization  and 
confessionalization,  from  which  no  one  of  the  Synoptics  is  en¬ 
tirely  free,  is  the  cause  of  Wellhausen’s  source-scepticism  which 
he  condenses  in  the  remark,  We  cannot  get  back  to  him ,  even 
if  we  would.  (Einl.,  S.  104). 

The  egocentric  words  of  Jesus  in  the  Gospels  can  furnish 
no  support  to  the  pathographic  contention.  In  the  Synoptics 
we  do  not  see  Jesus  consumed  with  his  own  ego  as  the  mega¬ 
lomaniac  or  the  paranoiac,  but  we  see  him  so  completely  con¬ 
sumed  in  the  great  cause  of  the  kingdom  of  God  that  he  entirely 
forgets  his  own  self  except  as  that  self  can  serve  and  sacrifice 
for  the  cause  that  he  champions  even  to  the  cross.  Not  his 
own  person,  but  the  kingdom  of  God,  its  coming,  its  nature, 
the  conditions  of  entrance  into  it,  and  the  winning  of  men  for 
it,  is  the  constant  thought  and  theme  of  Jesus’  every  parable, 
preaching,  prophecy,  and  prayer.  Never  once  is  Jesus  in  doubt 
about  this  kingdom ;  it  is  only  the  personal  part  that  he  is  to 
play  in  its  realization  that  is  problematic  for  him  and  presses 
him  apart  for  petition  and  pra}^er.  As  Carpenter  writes  of  the 
picture  of  Jesus  in  the  second  Gospel,  The  Jesus  of  Mark  is 
a  man ,  with  a  man’s  wrath  and  disappointment.  He  cannot  do 
everything ,  he  does  not  know  everything . Difficulty  can¬ 

not  overpower  him ,  or  danger  daunt ,  or  opposition  suppress 


THE  SOURCES 


145 


him.  He  may  perish,  but  his  cause  is  eternal.  The  kingdom 
will  triumph !  the  Son  of  Man  will  come!  (p.  217). 

b)  The  Eschatological  Elements  in  Jesus’  thought  and 
teaching  from  the  pathographic  point  of  view  are  to  be  a  mat¬ 
ter  for  special  discussion  in  the  following  chapter  (see  below 
p.  215ff). 

c)  The  Social  Teachings  of  Jesus 

Nietzsche  was  the  first  to  malign  Jesus’  individual  ethics 
and  morals  as  morbid.  Von  Hartmann  was  the  first  to  con¬ 
demn  the  social  teachings  of  Jesus  as  dangerous  and  destruc¬ 
tive  to  the  institutions  of  society.  It  is  Rasmussen  and  Binet- 
Sannle  who  see  in  Jesus’  social  attitudes  and  recommendations 
a  sure  symptom  of  morbid  mind. 

It  is  not  our  intention  here  to  go  into  a  discussion  of  Jesus’ 
social  teaching  and  its  agreement  or  disagreement  with  modern 
social  estimates  and  viewpoints.  This  field  has  already  been 
fairly  well  covered  by  men  like  Peabody,  Rauschenbusch, 
Shailer  Mathews,  Kent,  Soares  and  Horne.  We,  therefore,  urge 
only  a  few  general  considerations  pertinent  to  our  present  pro¬ 
blem  which  are  in  need  of  special  emphasis. 

For  Jesus  the  solution  of  social  situations  is  not  one  of 
method  and  mechanism  but  of  morals.  Social  justice  is  to  be 
the  result  of  principles,  not  of  precepts. 

Jesus  did  not  take  a  mechanical  view  of  the  world  and  man, 
but  a  personalistic  view.  Man  and  the  world  in  which  he  lives 
are  not  finished  products,  but  are  still  in  the  process  of  making. 
Both  are  improvable. 

We  live  in  a  very  different  world  from  that  of  Jesus.  A 
whole  new  world  of  civilization  and  culture  has  appeared  since 
his  day.  The  centers  of  civilization  and  culture  have  shifted 
to  the  north  and  west,  and  this  shift  has  brought  with  it  its 
own  special  and  peculiar  problems.  These  problems  never  con¬ 
fronted  Jesus  in  the  modern  sense.  Their  solutions  he  natur¬ 
ally  left  unformulated. 

Jesus  did  not  prescribe  all  the  details  of  conduct  for  any 
particular  situation  for  the  world  since  his  time  and  for  all 


146 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


time  to  come.  But  he  laid  down  certain  general  principles  for 
living  life,  both  as  individual  and  as  group,  and  has  left  the 
individual  or  group,  as  the  case  may  be,  to  determine  the  type  of 
conduct  that  is  in  harmony  with  his  spirit  of  living  life. 

Jesus  has  little  to  say  to  our  modern  day,  but  he  has  a 
great  deal  to  communicate.  His  contribution  to  the  solution 
of  the  social  problem  is  not  a  system  or  scheme,  but  the  gift  of 
a  spirit.  Men  are  to  live  together  in  all  the  aspects  of  social 
contact,  not  according  to  a  set  system  or  scheme,  but  in  a  spirit, 
the  spirit  of  the  Golden  Rule,  sacrifice  and  service. 

On  detailed  solutions  of  modern  social  problems  Jesus  is 
silent  for  clear  historical  reasons.  Standards  in  the  social 
scale,  wage  adjustments,  sharing  the  profits  of  production, 
ownership  of  natural  resources,  rights  and  responsibilities  of 
capital  and  labor,  etc.,  are  problems  that  did  not  exist  for  him. 

We  cannot  modernize  Jesus  and  force  him  to  speak  our 
language  and  think  our  thoughts  after  us.  We  must  leave  him 
in  his  own  historical  setting.  Jesus  was  born  in  Bethlehem  of 
Judea  in  the  days  of  Herod  the  king,  and  not  in  the  twentieth 
century.  We  must  leave  him  to  think  his  own  thoughts  and 
express  them  in  the  idioms  of  his  own  language  in  his  own  way. 
He  often  does  not  say  just  what  we  would  like  to  have  him  to 
say,  but  we  must  not  and  cannot  compel  him  to  speak  other¬ 
wise.  Our  task  is  not  only  to  understand  Jesus’  thought  and 
teaching  but  his  person,  and  to  translate  both  into  the  idioms 
of  our  own  day. 

We  must  learn  to  understand  Jesus  in  the  light  of  his  owTn 
historical  background.  Thereby  w*e  shall  find  that  much  that 
is  foreign,  or  even  repulsive,  to  us  today  in  the  thought  and 
teaching  of  Jesus  belongs  to  the  local  color  of  Jesus’  historical 
background  and  day. 

We  cannot  expect  from  Jesus  a  reply  to  a  particular  ques¬ 
tion  that  is  peculiar  to  our  present  stage  of  development  and 
culture.  Jesus  speaks  to  no  one  age  alone,  but  to  all  ages. 

It  is  only  the  neglect  of  such  historical  considerations  as 
are  above  outlined  that  can  lead  to  the  notion  that  the  social 
ethics  and  morals  of  Jesus  are  sickly  and  morbid. 


THE  SOURCES 


147 


B)  Biographical  Incidents 

We  now  come  to  those  biographical  incidents  in  the  Synop¬ 
tic  life  of  Jesus  which,  almost  without  exception,  have  figured 
in  one  form  or  another  in  the  pathographic  contention  to  the 
effect  that  Jesus  was  an  ecstatic,  an  epileptic,  or  a  paranoiac. 

a)  Jesus  at  Twelve  Years  Lc  2,41-51 

Whether  we  are  here  dealing  with  an  actual  historical  inci¬ 
dent  in  the  life  of  Jesus  is  open  to  such  serious  question  that 
many  New  Testament  scholars  reject  it  as  legendary,  or  apoc¬ 
ryphal.  It  is  not  related  by  either  Mt  or  Me ;  this  of  course 
weakens  its  literary  basis.  Yoelter  rejects  the  historicity  of 
Lc  2,22-51  for  two  reasons:  1)  this  section  of  Le’s  narrative 
of  the  nativity  and  boyhood  regards  both  Joseph  and  Mary 
as  the  real  parents  of  Jesus  in  contradiction  to  the  represen¬ 
tation  in  Lc  1,26-38;  2)  Lc  2,33  and  2,50  represent  both 
Joseph  and  Mary  as  absolutely  without  understanding  for  the 
words  of  Jesus,  or  words  spoken  about  him  by  others,  which 
is  not  reconcilable  with  the  representation  in  Lc  1,26-38  where 
Mar  y  seems  fully  cognizant  of  the  future  greatness  of  her  son 
(S.  57ff ;  75ff). 

The  fact  that  this  incident  in  the  temple  at  Jerusalem  is 
the  only  one  that  has  come  down  to  us  from  the  boyhood  and 
youth  of  Jesus  would  naturally  raise  the  question  as  to  just 
why  this  particular  incident  and  no  other  has  been  preserved 
from  this  obscure  period.  Reasons  can  be  given  for  1)  its 
invention,  if  apocryphal,  2)  its  preservation,  if  historical.  If 
apocryphal  it  would  be  invented  to  exhibit  the  remarkable  intel¬ 
lectual  ability  of  the  youthful  Jesus  which  enabled  him  to  con¬ 
found  the  old  doctors  in  the  temple.  This  is  a  theme  of  which 
the  apocryphal  gospels  are  very  fond.  Strauss  saw  in  this 
incident  a  myth  modelled  after  the  Old  Testament  accounts  of 
the  boy  Samuel  and  other  Old  Testament  characters  ( Leben 
Jesu,  1835,  I  335ff).  If  historical,  the  chief  motive  for  the 
preservation  of  this  incident  from  the  early  Christian  point  of 
view  would  be  the  extraordinary  God-consciousness  that  Jesus 
manifested  so  early  in  life. 

Neither  of  these  considerations  is  of  special  interest  to  us 


148 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


today.  That  Jesus  at  the  age  of  twelve  should  show  such  a 
marked  development  of  the  consciousness  that  fully  possessed 
him  in  later  life  is  not  at  all  remarkable  when  we  read  in  Rein- 
ecke’s  Meister  der  Tonkunst  (Berlin  &  Stuttgart,  1908,  S.  9), 
that  Mozart  began  to  compose  at  the  age  of  five,  and  his  father 
before  him  at  the  age  of  eight,  (S.  5).  Our  difficulty  with  the 
incident  is  moral,  in  that  Jesus  gives  such  an  indifferent,  if  not 
improper,  reply  to  his  anxious  parents.  It  could  be  argued 
that  this  answer  of  the  boy  Jesus  is  historical  for  it  corresponds 
exactly  to  the  attitude  which  he  seems  to  have  entertained 
toward  his  family  in  later  life.  For,  while  Me  8,81-85  is  less 
direct,  Jesus’  words  are  identical  in  tone  with  Lc  2,49  and 
betray  exactly  the  same  content  of  consciousness.  But  it  must 
be  remembered  that  we  know  not  how  many  of  the  words  of 
Jesus  we  possess  as  he  actually  spoke  them,  and  that  many 
of  them  bear  the  colorings  of  early  Christian  thought. 

The  early  Christians  in  their  preservation  and  transmis¬ 
sion  of  the  words  of  Jesus  did  not  subject  them  to  all  the  mod¬ 
ern  moral  proprieties  that  we  demand.  They  rather  took  de¬ 
light,  and  not  offense,  in  Jesus’  rebuffs,  not  only  to  his  enemies, 
but  to  his  most  intimate  disciples,  and  even  to  his  immediate 
family.  Neither  Mt  nor  Lc  takes  offense  at  Jesus’  words  in  Me 
8,81ff,  for  Mt  reproduces  Me  almost  verbatim;  Lc  abbrevi¬ 
ates,  but  the  import  of  Jesus’  words  concerning  his  true  kins¬ 
men  is  identical  with  that  of  Me.  The  offenses  that  Mt  and  Lc 
feel  in  their  reproductions  of  Me  are  theological  rather  than 
moral.  In  his  revision  of  Me  10,18  Mt  (19,17)  feels  a  theolog¬ 
ical  and  not  a  moral  difficulty.  This  lack  of  moral  offense  at 
the  words  of  Jesus  goes  to  its  greatest  extreme  in  the  apoc¬ 
ryphal  gospels  where  whole  incidents  are  created  to  the  end 
of  calling  forth  from  the  boy  Jesus  the  most  insolent  acts  and 
the  rudest  replies. 

The  most  important  thing  in  the  understanding  of  the 
words  and  incidents  in  the  life  of  Jesus  as  we  have  them  now  is 
historical  orientation.  If  the  incident  under  consideration  is  leg¬ 
endary,  it  cannot  figure  in  the  pathographic  contention.  If 
it  is  historical,  it  can  be  paralleled  by  many  and  still  more 
remarkable  incidents  in  the  lives  of  great  men  historically  less 


THE  SOURCES 


149 


removed  from  us  and  of  whom  we  know  a  great  deal  more  than 
we  do  about  the  life  of  Jesus,  yet  whose  mental  health  remains 
unquestioned.  (For  such  instances  see  Werner,  PGJ,  S.  55). 
The  moral  offense  is  modern  and  not  original,  otherwise  the 
incident  would  have  undergone  revision  somewhere  in  the  pro¬ 
cess  of  the  transmission  of  tradition.  It  is  the  lack  of  histor¬ 
ical  orientation  that  enables  Binet-Sangle  to  speak  of  this  inci¬ 
dent  in  the  temple  at  twelve  years  as  a  hebephrenic  crisis  due 
to  puberal  auto-intoxication,  and  de  Loosten  to  speak  of  a  pre¬ 
mature  intellectual  development  and  a  strongly  exaggerated 
self-consciousness  that  was  perhaps  not  free  from  ethical  defect. 

b)  The  Baptism  Mt  3,lS-17=Mc  l,9-ll=Lc  3,21-22 

That  the  baptism  of  Jesus  should  figure  prominently  in 
the  pathographic  position  is  only  natural  because  the  incident 
is  inaugural  in  the  place  it  occupies  in  the  evangelical  life  of 
Jesus  and  because  it,  not  only  historically,  but  psychologically 
marks  a  high  point  in  the  life  of  Jesus.  The  rupture  of  the 
heavens,  the  descent  of  the  dove,  and  the  assuring  voice  are 
psychic  phenomena  uncommon  and  unusual  to  the  average  run 
of  healthy-minded  persons  and  are  quite  common  and  usual 
in  the  experience  of  psychopathic  subjects. 

Holtzmann  (WJE,  S.  35ff)  sees  in  the  experience  at  the 
Jordan  the  ecstatic  beginning  of  Jesus’  public  ministry.  Here 
in  a  state  of  ecstasy  Jesus  wins  his.  Messianic  consciousness  in 
a  vision.  This  moment  is  the  only  possible  one  in  the  earlier 
part  of  Jesus’  public  career  that  could  furnish  a  stimulus  suffici¬ 
ently  strong  to  bring  him  into  this  ecstatic  consciousness. 
Henceforth  Jesus  knows  himself  to  be  possessed  by  a  spirit 
foreign  to  his  own  ego.  At  the  Jordan  Jesus  gains  that  en¬ 
thusiastic  and  ecstatic  faith  which  later  expresses  itself  in  his 
words  and  acts.  Rasmussen  speaks  of  the  experience  at  the 
baptism  as  an  hallucination  which  figured  prominently  in  Jesus’ 
subjective  life  (S.  142).  De  Loosten  tells  us  that  the  experi¬ 
ence  at  the  Jordan  was  the  culmination  of  a  long  process  of 
psychic  incubation  that  had  long  been  stirring  the  soul  of  Jesus. 
Here  Jesus  had  a  vision,  an  hallucination  in  the  visual  and  aud¬ 
itory  fields  of  sense,  which  is  to  be  explained  by  the  abnormal 
emotional  upheaval  in  which  Jesus  came  to  John  (S.  35ff). 


150 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Binet-Sangle  speaks  of  Jesus’  baptism  as  the  hallucination  at 
the  Jordan  (II  346ff).  The  striking  certainty  of  the  tone 
in  the  Baptist’s  message  and  the  contagious  exaltation  of  the 
multitude  threw  Jesus  into  an  emotional  state  most  favorable 
to  the  appearance  of  hallucinations.  The  experience  at  the 
Jordan  has  all  the  marks  of  a  genuine  hallucination;  it  is  inau¬ 
gural,  rural,  haute,  and  encourages  Jesus  in  his  delusions  of 
grandeur.  The  voice  is  distinct,  definite  and  imperative  as  is 
usually  the  case  in  religious  paranoia.  Hirsch  too  finds  Jesus 
at  the  Jordan  in  a  condition  of  intense  emotional  excitement ; 
the  hallucination  is  paranoiac  in  character  and  represents  only 
the  materialization  of  the  delusions  that  had  long  possessed 
him  (p.  105;  Ger.  S.  101). 

This  representation  of  Jesus’  experience  at  the  Jordan  has 
been  met  in  various  ways.  Schweitzer  reckons  with  the  prob¬ 
ability  of  a  vision  or  hallucination  at  the  Jordan,  but  he  throws 
doubt  upon  the  historicity  of  the  whole  scene  since  Jesus  enters 
upon  the  stage  of  history  only  with  his  appearance  in  Galilee 
(Me  1,14-15)  and  all  that  transpires  before  that  time  belongs 
to  unclear  and  uncertain  tradition  (PBJ,  S.  38f).  Against 
this  view  of  Schweitzer  it  suffices  to  say  that  for  Me  the  scene 
at  the  Jordan  is  as  historical  as  any  scene  in  the  whole  of  his 
Gospel.  In  fact,  this  inaugural  incident  is  indispensable  to 
the  whole  of  Mc’s  narrative,  for  in  it  we  have  Mc’s  christology, 
his  view  of  Jesus’  person.  For  Me  the  baptism  is  the  moment 
of  Jesus’  election  and  selection  as  the  Son  of  God  in  the  fullest 
sense  by  virtue  of  his  endowment  and  equipment  with  the  Divine 
Spirit. 

Others  have  tried  to  meet  the  difficulty  by  ascribing  the 
vision  to  the  Baptist  (Thus  Beyschlag,  II  110;  B.  Weiss,  I 
325).  They  point  out  that  the  whole  scene  at  the  Jordan  is 
presented  as  the  personal  and  private  experience  of  the  Baptist 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel  (1,32-33),  and  is  further  supported  bv 
the  voice  in  the  third  person  in  Mt  3, IT.  To  omit  critical  evi¬ 
dences  and  to  cite  only  historical  considerations,  it  is  to  be 
replied  that  the  vision  at  the  Jordan  cannot  have  been  that  of 
the  Baptist  for  his  later  conduct  does  not  correspond  with  the 
view  that  he  here  recognizes  Jesus  as  the  Messiah.  The  Baptist 


THE  SOURCES 


151 


does  not  voluntarily  retreat  or  resign  in  favor  of  Jesus.  He 
does  not  become  Jesus’  disciple  as  he  naturally  would  have 
become  if  he  had  received  at  the  Jordan  the  assurance  that  the 
Messiah  he  had  been  announcing  was  now  before  him.  It  is 
only  later  when  Jesus’  activity  is  at  its  height  that  the  Baptist 
comes  to  reflect  upon  the  possibilities  of  Jesus’  person.  If  the 
experience  at  the  Jordan  was  the  private  vision  of  the  Baptist 
he  does  not  seem  to  have  been  enlightened  or  benefited  by  it. 
(For  pertinent  points  in  this  connection  see  Rev.  G.  W.  Wade’s 
article,  Does  historical  criticism  imperil  the  substance  of  the 
Christian  faith?  Hibhert  Journal,  XYIII  2,  January  1920,  p. 
329). 

Still  others  urge  that  the  vision  and  voice  at  the  baptism 
were  public,  and  not  private  and  personal  for  either  Jesus  or 
John.  This  they  find  in  the  voice  in  the  third  person  in  Mt  and 
Lc’s  notice  in  3,21,  when  all  the  people  were  baptized ,  as  though 
the  bystanders  were  witnesses  and  hearers.  Apart  from  the 
psychological  difficulties  of  a  mass  vision,  this  view  makes  impos¬ 
sible  the  subsequent  public  and  popular  attitude  toward  Jesus 
which  seems  to  have  regarded  him  as  a  great  teacher  and  healer  ; 
it  would  render  senseless  Jesus’  own  commands  to  the  demon¬ 
iacs  and  to  his  disciples  for  silence  and  secrecy,  and  would  make 
unnecessary  the  transfiguration  scene,  as  well  as  the  confes¬ 
sions  at  Caesarea  Philippi  and  before  the  Jerusalem  authorities. 

The  experience  at  the  Jordan,  whether  it  be  classed  pop¬ 
ularly  as  a  religious  vision  or  psychologically  as  an  hallucina¬ 
tion,  is  the  private  and  personal  experience  of  Jesus.  This  is 
clear  in  the  Synoptic  text  itself.  Mt  and  Me  distinctly  say  that 
he  saw,  and  Lc,  though  he  omits  this  notice,  adds  the  equally 
favorable  psychological  motive  that  Jesus  was  praying.  Fur¬ 
ther,  Me  and  Lc  represent  the  voice  as  directly  addressed  to 
Jesus  in  the  second  person.  Mt’s  voice  in  the  third  person  con¬ 
tradicts  his  previous  notice,  he  saw.  In  I)  a  sys  c  of  Mt  the 
voice  speaks  in  the  second  person  as  in  Me  and  Lc.  Irenaeus 
cites  the  words  of  the  voice  in  Mt  3,17  in  the  second  person. 
The  texts  of  Me  and  Lc  are  constant  in  their  readings  in  the 
second  person,  the  only  variation  being  that  D  a  b  c  ff*  have  the 
voice  quote  Psalms  2,7,  which  version  of  Lc  3,22  was  known  to 


152 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Justin  Martyr,  Clement  of  Alexandria,  Origen,  and  Hilarius 
(Huck,  S.  13;  Resch,  3.  Heft,  S.  21f). 

That  the  Baptist  had  made  a  profound  popular  impres¬ 
sion  by_  his  appearance  and  message  is  clear  from  the  reluct¬ 
ance  of  the  chief  priests  and  scribes  to  pronounce  an  unfavor¬ 
able  judgment  regarding  his  baptism  (Me  ll,32=Mt  21,26= 
Lc  20,6).  Upon  presenting  himself  for  baptism  Jesus  must 
have  shared  fully  in  this  popular  impression  made  by  John,  and 
his  emotions  must  have  run  considerably  higher  than  those  of 
the  average  pious  person.  Here  it  suffices  to  recall  the  state¬ 
ment  of  Holtzmann  in  his  Leben  Jesu  (See  above  page  55)  to 
the  effect  that  Jesus’  experience  at  the  Jordan  betrays  no  psy¬ 
chopathic  elements,  for  Jesus  proves  the  clearness  of  his  judg¬ 
ment  and  the  strength  of  his  will  too  unmistakably  in  his  sub¬ 
sequent  life  to  deduce  his  vision  here  from  any  morbid  mental 
state ;  besides,  no  religion  has  ever  been  founded  by  a  personal¬ 
ity  whose  imagination  did  not  transcend  the  ABC  of  the  exper¬ 
iences  of  the  average  run  of  men. 

Case  is  dubious  about  the  ecstatic  element  in  Jesus’  exper¬ 
ience  at  the  Jordan,  This  picturesque  description — the  rending 
of  the  heaven ,  the  descending  dove ,  and  the  audible  utterance 
of  God  —  shows  the  primitive  Christians '  fondness  for  vivid 
imagery ,  while  the  prominence  given  to  the  ecstatic  element  in 
their  own  lives  easily  led  them  to  interpret  Jesus '  experience 
in  terms  of  ecstasy.  In  this  same  connection  Case  further 
remarks  quite  to  the  point,  All  that  can  be  inferred  from  Jesus' 
action  in  coming  to  John's  baptism  is  that  it  marked  a  decisive 
step  in  his  active  life.  It  was  the  response  of  his  oxen  pious 
life  to  the  religious  ideals  for  which  John  stood.  As  a  result 
of  this  action  Jesus'  religious  experience  would  naturally  be 
quickened  and  deepened  (p.  288). 

The  value  of  the  psychopathic  evidence  deduced  from  the 
baptism  can  only  be  determined  in  connection  with  the  deter¬ 
mination  of  the  role  which  visions,  or  any  single  psychic  exper¬ 
ience  or  moment,  played  in  the  life,  more  specially  in  the  self- 
consciousness  of  Jesus  (see  below  page  206ff). 


c)  The  Temptation  Me  1,12-13;  Mt  4,l-ll=Lc  4,1-13 


THE  SOURCES 


158 


The  account  of  the  temptation  of  Jesus,  especially  in  Mt 
and  Lc,  with  its  spirit  that  drives  or  leads,  with  its  period  of 
fasting,  the  appearances  of  the  angels,  wild  beasts  and  Satan, 
the  adventurous  and  spectacular  shifts  of  scene,  and  the  develop¬ 
ments  in  dialogue  has  proved  to  be  a  veritable  treasure  house 
from  which  the  pathographers  bring  forth  things  both  new  and 
old. 

For  Holtzmann  it  is  just  in  the  temptation  that  we  come 
to  recognize  the  true  character  of  Jesus’  ecstasy.  The  whole 
setting  of  the  forty  days  of  fasting  and  the  shifts  of  scene  are 
ecstatic.  But  here  we  see  Jesus  overcoming  ecstatic  excesses 
and  setting  restrictions  and  bounds  to  the  activities  of  the  spirit 
that  drove  him.  De  Loosten  sees  in  the  temptation  a  physio¬ 
logic  and  psychic  crisis  through  which  Jesus  passed  and  which 
was  attended  by  visions  and  illusions  corresponding  to  his  delu¬ 
sions  of  grandeur  and  provoked  by  his  weakened  physical  state 
after  the  long  period  of  fasting.  For  Binet-Sangle  it  was  in 
the  desert  that  Jesus  attained  that  hallucinatory  stage  of 
paranoia  in  which  the  hallucinations  follow  rapidly  one  upon  the 
other  and  constitute  a  mental  syndrome  known  as  le  ragle  (see 
above  page  96f).  Hirsch  writes:  During  the  forty  days  in  the 
wilderness  he  must  have  had  hallucinations  continually  (p.  112; 
Ger.  109).  These  forty  days  in  the  desert  mark  the  transition 
from  the  latent  to  the  active  phase  of  Jesus’  paranoia;  it  is  the 
period  of  the  complete  transformation  of  the  personality.  The 
formerly  isolated  and  disconnected  delusions  expand,  combine 
and  group  themselves  into  a  great  systematized  structure. 

The  critical  treatment  of  the  temptation  in  the  course  of 
the  life-of- Jesus  research  has  been  extremely  varied.  Venturini 
presented  this  scene  in  the  form  of  an  elaborate  dialogue  between 
Jesus  and  the  Pharisee  Soddac  (I  447ff).  Many  critics  and 
biographers  of  Jesus  have  found  in  the  temptation  account  only 
an  allegory  of  the  struggle  that  went  on  within  the  soul  of 
Jesus;  the  Satan  here  is  only  an  ego-Satan  ( I  ch- Sat  an  accord¬ 
ing  to  von  Delius,  S.  82).  Strauss  declared  the  whole  account 
a  myth  created  as  a  parallel  to  the  experiences  of  Moses  (Ex 
34,28)  and  Elijah  (I  Kgs  19,8).  Others  have  found  in  the 
temptation  a  legend,  or  a  corruptly  transmitted  parable  based 


154 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


upon  some  real  inner  experience  in  the  life  of  Jesus.  Case  sug¬ 
gests  that  the  account  of  his  temptation  which  tradition  has 
placed  in  close  connection  with  his  baptism  may  have  been  framed 
to  furnish  scriptural  authentication  for  Jesus'  failure  to  display 
at  once  messianic  prerogatives  (p.  288ff). 

But  that  the  threefold  temptation  in  one  form  or  another 
goes  back  to  actual  words  of  Jesus  is  clear  from  the  pertinent 
and  pointed  use  of  Scripture  which  is  thoroughly  characteristic 
of  Jesus’  command  of  it.  This  repulse  of  the  tempter  by  resort 
to  Scripture  has  a  pertinent  pointedness  and  piercing  power  of 
which  the  evangelists  do  not  show  themselves  capable,  especially 
Alt  who  clumsily  inserts  his  proof  from  prophecy  i  \  every  pos¬ 
sible  occasion.  As  examples  of  the  characteristic  command  of 
Scripture  by  Jesus  and  the  clumsy  inserts  by  Mt  are  to  be  cited 
Me  2,25;  11,17;  12,26  36  over  against  Mt  2,15  18;  4,14ff ; 
12,18ff;  13,35.  Apart  from  this  characteristic  command  of 
Scripture,  the  threefold  aspects  of  the  temptation  fit  too  vitally 
and  organically  into  later  incidents  in  Jesus’  public  career  in 
Me  to  be  declared  a  mere  literary  or  legendary  product  without 
parallel  or  occasion  in  the  public  ministry  of  Jesus.  This  we 
shall  see  presently. 

The  Gospel  of  Hebrews,  as  cited  twice  by  Origen  and  three 
times  by  Hieron}mius,  puts  the  story  of  the  temptation  in  the 
mouth  of  Jesus  in  the  first  person:  Then  my  mother ,  the  Holy 
Spirit,  took  me  (by  one  of  my  hairs)  and  carried  me  away  to 
the  top  of  Mount  Tabor  (Huck,  S.  15;  W.  Bauer,  S.  142f). 

The  three  temptations  in  one  form  or  another  go  back  to 
actual  words  of  Jesus  ;  Mt  and  Lc  have  taken  them  from  Q  and 
inserted  them  into  Mc’s  order  in  connection  with  his  general 
mention  of  a  period  of  temptation,  1,12-13.  They  set  the 
temptation  immediately  after  the  baptism,  for  they  seem  to 
regard  Jesus  as  having  gained  his  full  Messianic  consciousness 
at  the  Jordan.  Most  modern  critics  agree  with  this  Mt-Lc 
point  of  view  and  they  reinforce  this  position  by  pointing  out 
that  the  temptation  logically  and  psychologically  must  follow 
immediately  upon  the  experience  at  the  baptism,  for  moments 
of  high  exaltation  are  regularly  followed  by  times,  or  even 
periods  of  deep  depression.  Baldensperger  writes,  The  tempt - 


THE  SOURCES 


155 


ation  is  to  such  a  degree  a  psychological  necessity  and  is  so 
well  placed  at  the  threshold  of  Jesus'  public  ministry  that,  in 
its  peculiarity,  it  would  otherwise  be  hardly  comprehensible 

(S.  170). 

With  this  view  regarding  the  proper  place  for  the  inser¬ 
tion  of  the  threefold  temptation  we  cannot  agree.  The  varia¬ 
tions  of  Mt  and  Lc  in  both  their  introductions  and  conclusions 
and  their  close  correspondence  in  the  text  of  the  dialogues 
show  that  this  threefold  temptation  stood  in  Q  doubtless  as 
pure  discourse  material  without  historical  setting  and  without 
anv  connection  with  an  initial  retreat  to  the  desert  parallel 
to  Me  1,12-13. 

Mt  and  Lc  have  misplaced  their  account  of  the  temptation 
from  Q.  Then  the  question  arises:  Where  does  the  threefold 
temptation  belong  if  not  in  connection  with  the  general  men¬ 
tion  of  a  temptation  in  Me  1,12-13  ?  To  answer  this  question 
we  must  first  determine  the  principal  point  which  the  tempta¬ 
tion  would  seem  intended  to  make. 

In  the  first  two  temptations  of  Mt,  the  first  and  the  third 
of  Lc,  the  proper  place  of  miracle  and  the  legitimate  employ¬ 
ment  of  miracle-power  seem  to  receive  special  emphasis.  But 
if  the  temptation  has  to  do  with  the  place  that  miracle  is  to 
occupy  in  the  mission  and  ministry  of  Jesus,  the  question  must 
have  arisen  later  for  him  when  he  is  actually  confronted  wTith 
the  problem  of  his  miracle-power.  There  is  too  much  of  sur¬ 
prise  and  solicitude  in  Jesus’  mind  at  the  success  of  his  word 
and  touch  in  Me  1,21-38  to  suppose  that  the  whole  question 
had  been  settled  by  a  struggle  in  self  and  solitude  as  Mt  and 
Lc  would  have  us  believe.  Mt  omits  the  closing  scene  of  the 
day  in  Capernaum  (Me  1,35-38)  and  Lc  modifies  it  to  the 
extent  that  the  problem  is  less  personal  and  pressing  for  Jesus 
(Lc  1,12-13).  The  problem  of  miracle  and  miracle-power  does 
not,  nor,  we  may  add,  do  other  specific  problems  of  Jesus,  figure 
in  Mc’s  general  notice  of  the  temptation.  Me  sets  Jesus’  per¬ 
sonal  struggle  regarding  the  relation  of  miracle  and  message 
in  his  mission  and  ministry  at  the  close  of  the  first  day  of  the 
manifestation  of  Jesus’  power  to  cure  and  heal,  where  it  his¬ 
torically  and  psychologically  belongs. 


156 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


But  the  chief  point  to  this  threefold  temptation  according 
to  Mt  and  Lc  does  not  seem  to  be  miracle-power  and  its  legi¬ 
timate  employment,  for  all  three  temptations  focus  upon  the 
question  of  Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness,  its  credentials,  and 
course  of  conduct.  The  tempter  will  draw  inferences  from  this 
consciousness  of  being  the  Son  of  God  with  the  intention  of 
rejecting  them  as  false.  The  temptations  are  not  moral  in  the 
ordinary  sense  of  the  word,  but  Messianic.  But  it  is  just 
because  they  are  Messianic  that  they  are  moral  for  Jesus.  How¬ 
ever,  Me  does  not  give  us  the  least  suggestion  that  the  tempta¬ 
tion  was  Messianic  in  content  and  character. 

The  insertion  of  the  three  specific  temptations  from  Q  by 
Mt  and  Lc  in  connection  with  Me  1,12-13  is  purely  associa- 
tional,  and  not  historical  and  logical.  This  insertion  contra¬ 
dicts  the  climax  of  Mc’s  narrative  according  to  which  Jesus 
gains  clearness  concerning  his  Messianic  mission  and  role  only 
very  late  in  his  Galilean  ministry,  shortly  before  Caesarea 
Philippi,  and  not  during  the  first  retreat  to  the  desert.  If  Me 
had  known  and  used  the  threefold  temptation,  he  could  not 
have  introduced  it  into  his  narrative  at  1,12-13,  but  only  after 
the  rebuke  and  rebuff  of  Peter  in  8,33,  unless  he  had  com¬ 
pletely  revised  his  present  representation  of  Jesus’  painful 
climb  to  the  Messianic  conviction  or  had  crassly  contradicted 
himself. 

Me  regards  neither  the  question  of  miracle-power  nor  the 
Messianic  question  as  settled  once  for  all  with  1,12-13.  If  the 
question  of  miracle-power  and  its  employment  had  been  suc¬ 
cessfully  settled  in  the  desert,  why  should  this  same  problem 
be  so  pressing  and  personal  for  Jesus  in  Me  1,35-38?  If 
Jesus  became  clear  and  convinced  concerning  his  Messianic  dig¬ 
nity  at  this  early  date,  why  must  he  pass  through  such  con¬ 
flicts  of  consciousness  as  Me  represents  during  the  whole  of 
his  Galilean  ministry?  These  questions  cannot  be  answered 
by  remarking  that  the  temptation  in  the  desert  is  a  test  in  the 
abstract  and  the  subsequent  struggles  are  tests  in  the  con¬ 
crete.  In  fact,  the  process  is  exactly  the  reverse.  The  three¬ 
fold  temptation  is  an  allegorical  abstraction  sjunbolizing  the 
previous  particular  concrete  conflicts  in  Jesus’  consciousness. 


THE  SOURCES 


157 


That  the  temptation  in  the  desert  was  not  a  final,  once-for- 
all  struggle  with  Satan  is  clear  from  the  early  morning  flight 
from  Capernaum,  the  repeated  retreats  to  solitude  during  the 
Galilean  days,  which  retreats  suddenly  end  with  Caesarea 
Philippi,  and  Lc’s  own  notice  to  the  effect  that  Satan  departed 
from  him  for  a  season  (4,13).  Further  we  find  peculiar  to  Lc 
Jesus’  appreciative  word  to  his  disciples,  Ye  are  they  that  have 
continued  with  me  in  my  temptations  (22,28). 

That  Mt  and  Lc  have  misplaced  their  temptation  matter 
from  Q  is  further  clear  from  the  fact  that  the  three  single 
temptations  have  their  historical  connections  and  points  of 
contact  only  at  later  moments  in  the  subsequent  life  of  Jesus. 
(Compare  the  statement  of  H.  J.  Holtzmann  in  his  HC,  S.  46: 
Die  drei  Versuchungen  selbst  hahen  Hire  historischen  Anhalts- 
punkte  erst  in  spcieteren  Moment en  des  Lebens  Jesu).  They 
are  as  follows: 

1)  Me  1,35-38  can  easily  be  understood  and  ranged 
alongside  as  a  parallel  to  the  first  temptation  in  Mt  4,3-4= 
Lc  4,3-4.  In  both  Jesus  appears  in  the  same  dilemma;  both 
have  to  do  wTith  the  ethical  employment  of  miracle-power ;  both 
are  alike  seductive  in  that  both  appeal  to  the  use  of  miracle- 
power  in  behalf  of  supplying  natural  and  legitimate  human 
needs. 

2)  The  second  temptation  of  Mt,  the  third  of  Lc,  is  a 
parallel  to  the  demand  for  a  sign  in  Me  8,ll-12=Mt  16,1-4 
=Lc  11,29. 

3)  The  third  temptation  of  Mt,  the  second  of  Lc,  has 
its  logical  and  historical  connection  in  Me  8,S2b-33  (=Mt 
16,22-23)  where  Jesus  hears  the  tempter  speaking  through  the 
mouth  of  an  intimate  disciple.  Peter’s  rebuke  (Lc  omits  this 
rebuke  by  Peter  and  his  rebuff  by  Jesus)  would  as  completely 
turn  Jesus  from  the  divinely  appointed  path  as  if  he  were  to 
fall  down  and  worship  Satan.  Jesus’  rebuff  to  Peter  is  iden¬ 
tical  in  point  with  Jesus’  parting  parry  to  Satan  in  Mt  4,10 
(Lc  4,8).  D  Z  L  it  sydl  s  c  of  Mt  4,10  add  ojuoco  pou  and 
Jesus’  reply  to  the  tempter  then  reads  identically  with  his  sharp 
words  to  Peter  in  Me  8,33a  (— Mt  16,23a  VJtays  omcra)  pom 
aaxava  (compare  Huck,  S.  16). 


158 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


The  threefold  temptation,  although  it  goes  back  to  actual 
words  of  Jesus,  is  not  to  be  understood  as  a  single  situation 
and  struggle  of  soul  in  which  Jesus  found  himself  prior  to  his 
public  appearance  in  Galilee.  This  threefold  test  is  rather 
to  be  regarded  as  a  reflective  and  reminiscent  review  of  con¬ 
flicts  in  Jesus’  consciousness  which  had  been  repeatedly  repulsed 
in  the  past.  It  is  a  symbolical  summary  of  the  subjective  seduc¬ 
tions  that  presented  themselves  to  Jesus’  growing  Messianic 
consciousness  with  regard  to  which  he  gained  clearness  not 
later  than  Caesarea  Philippi  where  he  for  the  first  time  allows 
himself  to  be  greeted  as  the  Messiah  by  one  of  his  disciples ; 
also  where  he  does  not  protest  against  the  application  of  the 
title  to  himself  (Me  8,27ff),  yet  expresses  his  modifications 
and  reservations  in  its  use  (Me  8,31). 

If  anywhere  in  all  the  Gospels  Jesus  proves  his  psychic 
soundness  it  is  in  his  decisions  and  choices  as  represented  in 
the  threefold  temptation.  In  his  replies  to  the  suggestive  seduc¬ 
tions  of  Satan  we  witness  a  cutting  criticism  of  current  and 
contemporary  Messianic  ideals  which  corresponds  exactly  to 
Jesus’  complete  rejection  of  the  Messianic  title  in  the  ordinary 
sense,  and  yet  a  devotion  to  the  traditional  precepts  of  a  pure 
piety  that  is  the  diametrical  opposite  of  what  we  would  expect 
of  a  paranoiac.  We  witness  here  a  range  of  reflection,  a  clear¬ 
ness  of  moral  and  ethical  conception,  a  soundness  of  judg¬ 
ment,  a  directness  of  dialectic,  a  decided  and  determined  devo¬ 
tion  to  duty  as  interpreted  and  understood,  a  volume  of  whole¬ 
some  volition,  and  a  purity  of  piety  that  would  send  even  the 
specialist  in  normal  psychology  on  a  fruitless  search  among 
the  most  select  and  the  soundest  of  souls  to  produce  a  parallel, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  hope  of  citing  cases  confined  to  the  care 
of  a  clinic. 

It  is  well  for  Holtzmann  that  he  speaks  of  the  temptation 
as  an  ecstatic  experience  of  Jesus  in  which,  contrary  to  what 
is  commonly  understood  as  ecstasy,  Jesus  ends  the  struggle  by 
an  Ueberwindung  der  Ekstase,  for  no  psychological  element 
in  the  account  of  the  threefold  temptation  is  more  pronounced 
than  that  of  choice  and  volition.  In  genuine  ecstasy,  to  speak 


THE  SOURCES 


159 


with  Ribot,  there  is  a  minimum,  if  not  a  zero  of  mil  (DW, 
p.  107). 

d)  Me  3,21 :  Jesus  and  his  Contemporaries 

The  pathographers  of  Jesus  feel  that  they  are  simply 
following  in  the  footsteps  of  Jesus’  friends  and  family.  Binet- 
Sangle  traces  the  history  of  the  discovery  of  the  insanity  of 
Jesus  from  Me  3,21  down  to  his  own  work  (IV  295-326). 
Not  one  of  the  pathographers  fails  to  cite  Me  3,21 :  And  when 
his  friends  heard  it,  they  went  out  to  lay  hold  on  him:  for  they 
said,  He  is  beside  himself.  On  this  particular  notice  of  Me 
Soury  commented:  If  Mary  and  the  brothers  of  Jesus  had 
brought  him  again  into  the  house  of  the  carpenter  of  Nazareth , 
the  Galilean  prophet  would  perhaps  have  ended  his  life  obscure¬ 
ly  in  some  cellar  of  the  paternal  dwelling,  held  by  a  chain  as 
the  Gadarene  demoniac  (p.  71f).  Binet-Sangle  remarks,  Thus 
we  see  them  leaguing  Nazareth  and  setting  out  for  Capernaum, 
where  Jesus  then  resided,  and  doing  all  in  their  power  to  lay 
hands  on  him  doubtless  with  the  intention  of  sequestering  him 
and  binding  him  with  chains  as  was  the  custom  of  the  time  in 

the  treatment  of  dangerous  aliens . Knowing  wliat  awaited 

him,  he  refused  to  disperse  the  crowd  before  him.  They  must 
then  for  the  time  being  cease  to  trouble  themselves  about  him 
and  abandon  him  to  his  vesania  (I  126f). 

The  offense  caused  by  Me  3,21  is  as  old  as  the  Gospels  of 
Mt  and  Lc  who  both  omit  it.  This  offense  is  also  evinced  in 
many  of  the  Latin  translations  in  which  this  verse  is  omitted. 
It  is  as  recent  as  the  latest  life  of  Jesus,  which  was  written 
by  J.  Lepsius  in  1917-18.  For  the  most  part,  this  offense  has 
been  out  of  all  connection  with  the  psychiatric  problem.  On 
two  scores  it  has  been  a  source  of  trouble  to  the  Christian  con¬ 
science :  1)  that  Jesus’  own  people,  especially  Mary,  could 

make  such  a  charge;  2)  that  such  a  thing  could  be  thought  or 
said  of  Jesus  by  anyone.  In  the  course  of  the  life-of- Jesus 
research  Me  3,21  has  been  treated  along  these  two  lines. 

Venturini  saw  in  Me  3,21,  not  the  opinion  of  Jesus’  friends 
or  family,  but  the  exasperation  of  Jesus’  host  who  had  tried 
in  vain  to  get  him  to  come  and  eat.  Hase  ascribed  the  charge 


160 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


in  Me  3,21  to  the  instigation  of  the  Pharisees  who  appear  in 
verse  22  and  who  had  a  mental  murder  in  mind  (S.  592).  Keini 
insisted  that  the  friends  in  Me  3,21  are  not  Jesus’  mother  and 
brethren,  who  appear  in  verse  31,  but  that  verse  20f  and  verses 
31  ff  are  two  separate  and  independent  scenes.  This  method 
of  assigning  the  charge  to  Jesus’  enemies  can  cite  certain  of 
the  Latin  translations,  (D*  a  b  d  ff'  i  q)  which  Wellhausen 
quotes  as  reading  '/ai  ots  qwuaav  jxsol  auxou  ot  ypappaxelg  Kai 
ol  ?iOurol  sHfjMlov  xpaxrjaai  auxov  eTisyov  yag  oxi  slsoxaxai 
avroug  (Marci,  S.  25)  and  which  throws  Mary  into  a  much 
more  favorable  light  and  relieves  Jesus  of  the  charge  of  mental 
alienation.  But  Wellhausen  says  that  this  reading  is  clearly 
a  correction  (Ma  rci,  S.  26).  Sir  John  C.  Hawkins  agrees  with 
Wellhausen  and  sees  here  an  attempt  to  avoid  difficulty  (p. 
119).  Hoffmann  regards  this  correction  as  very  old  (S.  118). 
Volkmar,  before  them,  was  more  out-spoken.  He  called  these 
variations  in  the  Latin  clear  attempts  of  Latin  monks  to  ex¬ 
punge  the  scandal  (which  he  called  der  Mutter-Wahn)  from 
the  virgin  mother  (S.  221,  257 ff).  ot  Jiap’  carrot)  is  a  rather 
unusual  and  infrequent  expression,  but  the  consensus  of  critical 
opinion  sees  in  it  a  definite  designation  of  some  of  Jesus’  own 
kin.  Wellhausen  finds  the  most  original  reading  in  the  Syrian 
versions  where  ol  d§e7qpoi  airrou  displaces  ol  Jiao’  aircov- 

Other  critics  leave  these  words  in  the  mouth  of  Mary,  but 
seek  to  tone  them  down  by  the  introduction  of  various  motives. 
Neander  found  it  hardly  conceivable  that  Mary  could  think 

%J 

such  a  thing  of  her  son ;  she  came  to  Capernaum  doubtless  sol¬ 
icitous  for  the  safety  of  her  son  in  view  of  the  threatening 
developments  (S.  420).  B.  Weiss  writes:  The  whole  account 
does  not  exhibit  the  least  trace  of  any  mental  alienation ,  but 
plainly  proves  the  easily  understood  care  and  anxiety  which, 
if  somewhat  limited ,  was  exceedingly  well-intentioned .  bestowed 
on  the  member  of  the  family  who  had  been  too  long  removed 
from  the  others  (II  284).  Lepsius  reminds  us  of  the  romantic 
lives  of  Jesus  when  he  finds  Mary  on  this  occasion  to  be  an  inno¬ 
cent  tool  in  the  plot  of  the  chief  of  the  synagogue  at  Caper¬ 
naum  to  get  Jesus  out  of  the  way. 

B.  Weiss  further  remarked  that  eleoxq  does  not  neces- 


THE  SOURCES 


161 


sarily  denote  the  state  of  being  beside  one's  self ,  for  Me  employs 
this  word  elsewhere  (2,12 ;  5,12;  6,51)  with  only  conjugational 
variations  in  describing  the  amazement  of  the  multitudes  (II 
283)  ;  it  would  denote  here  then  only  the  state  of  wronder  or 
awe  in  which  Jesus  found  himself.  But  Volkmar  had  long  be¬ 
fore  remarked:  Here  amazement  on  the  part  of  Jesus  is  not 
to  be  thought  of.  The  absolute  £§80Tr}  can  only  mean  for  Me: 
he  was  beside  himself ,  or  insane  (S.  256).  He  finds  the  con¬ 
notation  of  this  word  here  to  be  identical  with  Paul’s  use  of  it 
in  II  Cor  5,13.  Still  others  avoid  the  difficulty  by  interpreting 
E|scrrr|  as  meaning  that  Jesus  was  exhausted,  or  had  fainted , 
or  departed.  Bleek  sees  in  Me  3,21  not  an  expressed  opinion 
but  rather  the  second  evangelist’s  explanation  of  the  action  of 
Jesus’  family:  But  it  is  not  necessary  to  assume  that  Jesus ’ 
family,  or  any  member  of  it,  used  just  this  expression ;  it  is 
rather  the  evangelist  who  designates  briefly  in  this  way  how  he 
believes  they  regarded  the  incident  and  how  he  thinks  their 
action  is  to  be  explained  (I  506). 

But  liberal  criticism  as  a  whole  is  more  severe  and  less 
careful  for  the  character  and  conduct  of  Mary  and  concedes 
the  historicity  of  the  scene  in  Me  3,21  as  representing  the 
actual  attitude  of  Jesus’  family  toward  him.  Volkmar  writes: 
There  is  perhaps  no  other  sentence  in  Me,  or  in  the  other  gos¬ 
pels,  that  in  and  of  itself  is  as  historical  and  credible  as  this 
one  (S.  226).  [It  is  only  fair  to  say  that  Volkmar  reckons  here 
with  the  possibility  of  a  myth-formation  patterned  after  the 
visit  to  Moses  by  his  family  in  Ex  18].  Emil  Wendling  ascribes 
3,21  to  Ur  mark  us  (S.  21ff).  P.  W.  Schmiedel  sets  Me  3,21 
at  the  head  of  the  list  of  his  nine  historical  ground-pillars  for 
a  scientific  life  of  Jesus  (PJSMG,  S.  7).  O.  Holtzmann  con¬ 
ceives  the  whole  scene  as  follows :  Jesus’  mother  and  brethren 
were  dissatisfied  with  Jesus’  refusal  to  return  home  from  the 
Jordan  and  take  up  his  previous  occupation.  Jesus’  uncon¬ 
ventional  words  and  conduct  in  the  meantime  had  reflected  upon 
them  and  they  came  to  Capernaum  convinced  of  his  derange¬ 
ment  and  determined  to  take  him  back  by  force  if  necessary. 
But  their  plan  failed  because  Jesus  was  surrounded  by  his  ad¬ 
mirers  and  followers  (LJ,  S.  193). 


162 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Regarding  the  meaning  of  liberal  critics  are  also 

unanimously  agreed  that  Me  intends  here  to  tell  us  that,  in  the 
opinion  of  his  friends  or  family,  Jesus  was  in  a  state  bordering 
on  insanity. 

Our  effort  here  cannot  be  in  the  direction  of  explaining 
Me  3,21  away,  for  it  seems  to  belong  to  the  bed-rock  of  earliest 
tradition.  Nevertheless  we  can  urge  a  general  consideration 
drawn  from  Me  as  a  whole,  and  the  other  Gospels  as  well,  which 
will  throw  some  light  on  Me  3,21  and  help  toward  historical 
orientation  and  appreciation.  The  Gospel  writers  themselves, 
specially  Me,  seem  to  delight  in  portraying  a  lack  of  under¬ 
standing  of  Jesus’  words  and  conduct  on  the  part  of  not  only 
Jesus’  family,  but  of  his  own  disciples  whose  dullness  throws 
a  not  altogether  favorable  light  upon  them  (See  Wrede,  MGE, 
^  lOlff).  In  Me  the  dullness  of  the  disciples  is  almost  incon¬ 
ceivable.  Jesus’  clearest  words  and  parables  they  either  fail 
to  understand  and  must  demand  a  private  explanation,  or  they 
misunderstand  them  and  must  be  subsequently  corrected  (see 
Me  4,10  13  33f ;  6,52 ;  7,17-19 ;  8,16-21 ;  9,10  32 ;  10,10).  In 
spite  of  the  simplicity  of  their  origin  and  former  surroundings 
historical  probability  is  against  Mc’s  representation  of  the  in¬ 
ferior  mentality  of  Jesus’  intimate  followers.  That  Me  is  here 
exaggerating  is  clear  from  the  fact  that  Jesus’  opponents  seem 
to  gather,  without  the  least  hesitation,  the  import  of  Jesus’ 
remarks  and  parables  directed  against  them  which  are  not  less 
unclear  and  indirect  than  those  addressed  to  the  disciples.  It 
is  not  historical  exactness  and  completeness  that  causes  Me  to 
faithfully  report  the  situation  in  3,21.  It  is  rather  his  desire 
and  delight  to  show  that  neither  Jesus’  friends  nor  family, 
those  who  knew  him  best,  were  equal  to  the  task  of  fully  under¬ 
standing  him.  This  constitutes  an  essential  element  in  Mc’s 
theology,  namely,  that  Jesus,  his  person  and  his  preaching  as 
well,  was  and  is  incomprehensible.  (This  tendency  is  still  more 
pronounced  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  where  Jesus  is  ceaselessly  not 
understood  or  is  misunderstood,  and  the  disciples  are  so  woe¬ 
fully  weak  of  understanding  that  he  must  reserve  many  things 
that  he  would  like  to  say  to  them  until  a  later  time.  See  Jn 
2,20f;  3,4;  4,11  33;  6,42  52;  7,35;  8,22  27  57;  10,6;  11,13 


THE  SOURCES 


163 


21;  14,5;  16,17-18).  This  incomprehensibleness  of  Jesus’  per¬ 
son  Me  accomplishes  not  so  much  by  the  exaltation  of  Jesus 
himself  as  by  bringing  Jesus’  disciples,  friends,  and  family 
down  to  a  level  of  intelligence  that  hardly  does  them  historical 
justice. 

But  Me  3,21  does  not  exhaust  the  New  Testament  con¬ 
temporary  judgment  against  the  psychic  soundness  of  Jesus. 
In  the  very  next  verse  wrn  read  that  scribes  (Mt  12,24 — Phari- 
sees= Lc  11,15 — some  of  them)  say  that  Jesus  was  insane,  that 
is,  He  hath  Beelzebub.  This  scene  is  doubly  attested  in  the 
sources;  it  is  found  in  both  Me  and  Q.  The  subsequent  Beelze¬ 
bub  address  is  a  bit  more  elaborate  in  Q,  but  the  charge  is  more 
severe  in  Me.  Mt  and  Lc  avoid  the  direct  charge  of  possession 
by  modifying  Mc’s  Bse^sho vk  syei,  -which  is  repeated  in 
effect  in  verse  30  (jtvsupa  axdffaoTov  syei)  and  both  of  -which 
are  employed  elsewhere  only  in  reference  to  cases  of  demoniacal 
possession  encountered  by  Jesus,  to  £V  tep  Pse^shohA  (Lc  has 
the  article  follow)  which  would  designate  not  more  than  an 
agency  of  or  an  alliance  with  the  evil  powers.  It  is  possible 
that  Mt  and  Lc  found  their  form  of  the  charge  in  Q.  Volkmar 
found  Me  3,30  a  still  worse  surmise  than  3,21.  A.  Bollinger 
also  finds  the  diagnosis  here  less  mild,  but  sees  the  more  original 
form  of  the  charge  in  Mt  12,24,  of  which  Me  3,22  is  only  a 
secondary  revision  (S.  55ff). 

This  charge  against  Jesus  on  the  part  of  the  religious 
authorities  is  easily  understandable  in  view  of  the  conflict  that 
went  on  between  them.  It  was  the  habit  of  the  religious  author¬ 
ities  to  brand  as  insane  the  prophets  of  a  religion  that  would 
revolutionize  their  own.  They  pronounced  a  like  judgment 
upon  the  Baptist  (Mt  li,18=Lc  7,33)  as  did  their  fathers 
before  them  upon  the  prophets  of  their  day  (Jer  29,26;  Hos 
9,7;  the  prophets  in  general,  I  Sam  10  and  19;  II  Kgs  9,11; 
Zech  13).  The  nature  of  some  of  John’s  preaching,  as  well 
as  that  of  Jesus,  (Mt  3,7-10=Lc  3,7-9;  Mt  23,13-36=Lc 
11,37-52),  with  its  direct  denunciation  of  the  religious  author¬ 
ities  makes  quite  clear  their  charge  of  possession.  It  was  not 
the  eccentricities  in  the  Baptist’s  habits  of  life  (Mt  3,4=Mc 
1,6),  but  his  message  that  aroused  them.  To  say  nothing  of 


164 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Jesus  in  this  connection,  John’s  practical  advice  to  his  inquirers 
in  Lc  3,10-14  is  hardly  that  of  an  unsound  mind. 

De  Loosten  alone  sees  in  Lc  4,23,  Physician ,  heal  thyself , 
a  taunt  or  insult  which  Jesus  was  forced  to  hear  early  in  his 
ministry  of  healing  (S.  62).  But  this  is  plainly  a  parable  as 
Jesus  designates  it;  it  may  be  original  with  Jesus  or  a  current 
axiom  revised  and  employed  by  him  (See  Juelicher,  GR,  II 
171ff). 

To  the  contemporary  charges  and  opinions  concerning  the 
soundness  of  Jesus’  mind  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  belong  7,19-20; 
8,48-52;  10,19-21.  The  first  and  third  passages  are  interest¬ 
ing  parallels  to  Me  3,22  30.  The  second  may  be  a  remote 
parallel.  But  the  present  form  of  all  three  is  a  Johannine  crea¬ 
tion.  The}7  figure  too  clearly  in  the  author’s  elaborate  system 
of  the  development  of  hostilities  and  sworn  enmity  between 
Jesus  and  the  Jews  (  !),  and  in  the  staging  of  divisions  of  con¬ 
temporary  opinion  concerning  Jesus’  person,  of  which  the 
Fourth  Evangelist  is  very  fond  (12,29).  Jn  7>5  is  perhaps 
an  instructive  parallel  to  Me  3,21. 

There  is  no  need  or  purpose  in  trying  to  explain  Me 
3,21  22  away.  Both  constituted  a  problem  for  Mt  and  Lc  as 
they  do  for  us.  They  solved  the  difficulty  by  omission  or  mod- 
ideation ;  this  we  cannot  do.  We  may  urge  critical  considera¬ 
tions  concerning  Mc’s  theology  of  Jesus’  person  as  incompre¬ 
hensible  and  his  method  of  presenting  his  theology.  Historical 
reconstruction  may  find  reasons  for  an  estrangement  between 
Jesus  and  his  family.  We  know  further  that  a  man’s  enemies 
are  seldom,  if  ever,  reliable  and  impartial  judges  of  his  mental 
soundness.  But  we  must  admit  that  some  of  Jesus’  contem¬ 
poraries,  some  of  his  family  and  friends  as  well  as  his  foes, 
regarded  him  as  an  alien.  But  that  these  contemporary  judg¬ 
ments  passed  upon  Jesus  are  correct  is  quite  a  different  ques¬ 
tion  which  can  be  answered  only  by  our  study  as  a  whole. 

Dr.  F.  Moerchen,  Head-Physician  in  Ahrweiler,  writes  in 
his  pamphlet,  Die  Psycliologie  der  Heiligkeit  (S.  13)  :  The 
champion  of  religion  in  particular  is  readily  subjected 
to  the  adverse  judgment  of  the  crowd  which  feels  the  abnormal 
and  striking  element  in  his  thought  and  action  as  something 


THE  SOURCES 


165 


foreign  and  unintelligible  to  it.  Concerning  the  scientific  worth 
of  these  contemporary  judgments  he  says,  But  critical  judg¬ 
ment  of  the  contemporary  background,  of  the  intellectual  milieu 
from  which  the  saints  and  other  religious  heroes  come,  must 
admonish  us  to  apply  to  them  with  caution  the  measure  of  mod¬ 
ern  psychological  and  psychiatric  methods  of  observation. 

Sommer  writes:  Experience  teaches  that  many  men  have 
been  regarded  by  their  contemporaries  as  half  or  wholly  para¬ 
noiac  whom  the  historian  looks  upon  as  the  pioneers  of  new 
thoughts  (Quoted  by  Werner,  PGJ,  S.  6).  Such  was  the  exper¬ 
ience  of  Luther,  Goethe,  and  Bismarck.  One  nerve-specialist 
diagnosed  the  case  of  the  late  and  honored  Theodore  Roosevelt 
as  paranoia  reformatoria  (See  Werner,  PGJ,  S.  7). 

A.  Schweitzer  remarks  to  the  point  that  such  amateur 
judgments  of  the  remote  past  as  are  found  in  Me  3,21  22  are 
entirely  without  significance  for  modern  psychiatry  (PBJ,  S. 
25  Anm.  1).  From  the  strictly  medical  point  of  view  Dr. 
Moerchen  writes :  The  contemporaries  of  Christ  were  not  so 
trained  in  psychology  that  we  could  utilize  scientifically  any 
of  their  chance  utterances  concerning  striking  psychic  pheno¬ 
mena  (MKP,  S.  423). 

e)  The  Transfiguration  Alt  17,1-8— Me  9,2-8=Lc  9,28-36 

De  Loosten  finds  in  the  transfiguration  one  of  those  occas¬ 
ional  instances  in  which  the  disciples  are  witnesses  of  Jesus’ 
ecstatic  experiences.  Why  Jesus  selects  just  these  three  dis¬ 
ciples  is  unclear;  he  probably  felt  the  approach  of  an  unusually 
exalted  state  and  would  suffer  only  his  most  intimate  compan¬ 
ions  as  witnesses.  The  two  prophets  whom  he  sees  and  with 
whom  he  speaks  are  hallucinated.  Jesus’  power  of  hypnotic 
suggestion  over  the  disciples  enabled  him  to  make  them  see  and 
hear  what  he  saw  and  heard.  That  Jesus  was  fully  aware  of 
the  pathological  character  of  the  experience  is  clear  from  his 
command  for  silence.  But  this  was  unnecessary,  for  the  dis¬ 
ciples  realized  the  sad  state  of  their  master’s  mind  and  volun¬ 
tarily  held  their  peace,  Lc  9,36b  (S.  59ff).  Binet-Sangle 
sees  here  an  attack  of  ecstasy  attended  by  facial  transfigura¬ 
tion  not  unknown  in  certain  varieties  of  cataleptic  attack  (I 


1 66 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


SI  Iff).  For  Hirsch,  Jesus’  hallucinations  form  the  basis  of 
the  story  of  the  transfiguration  (p.  HSf ;  Ger.  110).  Bau¬ 
mann  construes  the  account  as  a  vision  common  to  all  four  pres¬ 
ent  (S.  SI). 

The  conclusions  of  modern  research  in  the  life  of  Jesus 


have  set  the  transfiguration,  in  one  way  or  in  another,  in  con¬ 
nection  with  the  confession  of  Peter  at  Caesarea  Philippi.  A. 
Schweitzer  has  it  precede  the  confession  of  Peter,  for  it  is  at 
Caesarea  Philippi  that  Peter  betrays  to  the  twelve  the  secret 
he  had  learned  on  the  mount  of  transfiguration,  (MLG,  S. 
60ff).  J.  Weiss  and  Wellhausen  have  the  transfiguration  fol¬ 
low  Caesarea  Philippi:  the  former  finds  the  voice  the  first  and 
positive  answer  to  Peter’s  confession  (AeE,  S.  228ff)  ;  the  lat¬ 
ter  finds  that  the  voice  sets  the  divine  seal  upon  this  confes¬ 
sion  (Marci,  S.  71).  Baldensperger  also  finds  the  transfigur¬ 
ation  scene  in  its  correct  chronological  place  as  it  now  stands 
in  the  Synoptics  (SBJ,  S.  188,  Anm.  1).  O.  Holtzmann  iden¬ 
tifies  the  two  incidents,  the  transfiguration  being  only  the  sub¬ 
jective  side  of  the  disciples’  experience  which  is  objectively 
recounted  as  Peter’s  confession  at  Caesarea  Philippi. 

The  problem  of  the  transfiguration  from  the  psychiatric 
point  of  view  is  simply  solved.  One  has  only  to  read  the  ac¬ 
counts  of  it  as  it  stands  in  the  New  Testament.  Rasmussen 


and  Holtzmann  do  not  employ  it  in  their  contentions.  The  lat¬ 
ter  writes:  In  the  transfiguration  scene  Jesus  is  the  object ,  not 
the  subject  of  the  revelation  (WJE,  S.  39,  Anm.  1). 

The  account  of  the  transfiguration  is  rich  in  psychological 
details  which  show,  however,  that  the  vision  is  not  that  of  Jesus 


but  of  the  disciples : 
Mt 

There  appeared 
unto  them 


Me 

There  appeared 
unto  them 


They  were  sore 
a,fraid  . 


Peter  knew  not 
what  he  said . . . 
They  were  sore 
afraid  . 


Lc 


Now  Peter  and  they 
that  were  with  him 
were  heavy  with 
sleep ;  but  when 
they  were  fully 
awake,  they  saw .... 
Peter,  not  knowing 

what  he  said . 

They 

feared . 


THE  SOURCES 


167 


(Spitta  finds  Lc’s  account  the  more  original;  S.  217f). 

The  voice  in  all  three  Gospels,  as  well  as  in  the  various 
texts  of  the  same  Gospel,  speaks  consistently  in  the  third  per¬ 
son.  A  C  D  N  A  T.  . .  min  beef  q  vg  sy  s  c  of  Lc  9,35  read 
dyajtrprog  instead  of  ^  exkAeypsvog  ;  further,  Cs  D  M  a  add 
£v  (b  qijSoxrjacc  as  in  Alt  17,5  (Huck,  S.  103).  In  the  account 
of  the  transfiguration  in  II  Peter  1,17-18  ( For  he  received  from 
God  the  Father ,  honor  and  glory ,  when  there  was  borne  such 
a  voice  to  him  by  the  Majestic  Glory ,  This  is  my  beloved  Son , 
in  whom  I  am  well  pleased;  and  this  voice  we  ourselves  heard 
borne  out  of  heaven ,  when  we  were  with  him  in  the  holy  mount) 
the  voice  is  addressed  to  Jesus,  but  the  disciples  are  ear-wit¬ 
nesses  for  whom  the  message  is  really  intended  since  it  comes 
in  the  third  person.  In  John  12,28-30  the  voice  seems  ad¬ 
dressed  to  Jesus,  but  is  unintelligible  to  some  of  the  by-standers 
for  whose  sake  it  is  nevertheless  uttered.  But  this  Johannine 
account  of  the  transfiguration  is  so  radically  revised  that  it  is 
an  almost  unrecognizable  remnant  of  the  Synoptic  account  and 
does  not  deserve  historical  credibility. 

Against  Binet-Sangle’s  description  of  a  cataleptic  meta¬ 
morphosis  is  to  be  urged  the  fact  that  not  only  Jesus’  face, 
but  his  garments  and  whole  figure  are  transfigured.  This 
makes  it  clear  that  the  experience  is  that  of  the  disciples  and 
not  of  Jesus. 

There  is  a  further  probability  that  we  have  here,  not  an 
incident  from  the  historical  life  of  Jesus,  but  a  resurrection 
experience.  J.  Weiss  finds  it  to  be  an  anticipation  of  the  resur¬ 
rection  appearances  (AeE,  S.  229f).  Wellhausen  says  that 
it  was  originally  an  appearance  of  the  risen  Lord  (Alarci,  S. 
71).  In  common  with  the  resurrection  appearances  we  note 
that  the  transfiguration  is  in  Galilee  (Ale  16,7  ;  Alt  28,7),  is 
on  a  mountain  (Alt  28,16),  Jesus  appears  in  glorified  form, 
a  cloud  disperses  the  vision  and  the  Syrian  version  of  Ale  9,7 
reads  that  the  cloud  envelopes  him  (aura)  instead  of  amoic;) 
as  in  Acts  1,9  which  Wellhausen  considers  the  more  original 
reading  (Alarci,  S.  71). 

Further  the  transfiguration  seems  to  be  the  original  re¬ 
surrection  appearance  to  Peter  referred  to  in  Lc  21,31  and  I 


168 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Cor  15,5.  J.  Weiss  says  that  the  transfiguration  was  origin¬ 
ally  a  vision  to  Peter  only  (SdNT,  I  155f).  Schweitzer  speaks 
of  it  as  an  illusion  of  Peter  (PBJ,  S.  38).  Besides,  the  role 
of  Peter  in  the  incident  is  so  predominant  that  the  other  two 
disciples  could  completely  disappear  without  disturbing  the 
scene. 

f)  The  Cursing  of  the  Fig  Tree  Mt  21,18-20= 

Me  11,12-14  20-22 

In  so  far  as  our  present  problem  is  concerned,  von  Hart¬ 
mann  was  the  first  to  begin  the  quarrel  with  the  cursing  of  the 
fig  tree.  He  saw  in  this  incident  the  ease  with  which  Jesus’ 
anger  could  flash  up  even  on  the  most  harmless  occasions  and 
avenge  itself  most  uncritically  upon  innocent  objects,  (S.  69). 
De  Loosten  speaks  of  the  senseless  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  wdfich 
is  to  be  understood  only  in  the  light  of  the  highly  pitched  ner¬ 
vous  tension  in  which  Jesus  found  himself  during  his  Jerusalem 
days  (S.  77f).  Binet-Sangle  cites  and  agrees  with  von  Hol- 
bach  in  designating  this  act  of  Jesus  as  impossible  to  a  man 
of  sound  mind. 

The  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  was  problematic  as  far  back 
as  the  church  fathers  Origen  and  Ambrosius.  In  the  course 
of  modern  criticism  none  have  left  it  untouched.  The  natural¬ 
istic  explanation  began  with  Paulus  who  found  Jesus’  curse 
only  a  statement  based  upon  his  own  observation  of  the  fact 
that  the  tree  was  dying  and  could  never  bear  again.  On  Me 
11,13c  he  comments,  It  was  just  a  poor  season  for  figs  (EHB, 
III  157).  Bleek  followed  in  the  footsteps  of  Paulus  but  re¬ 
fused  to  surrender  the  miracle.  Jesus’  words  only  accelerated 
the  process  of  corruption  that  was  alread}^  at  work  at  the 
tree’s  heart;  Jesus  destroyed  no  healthy  part  of  the  tree  but 
simply  hastened  the  inevitable  issue.  However,  he  assures  us 
that  this  miracle  was  not  performed  during  Jesus’  last  Jeru¬ 
salem  days,  but  during  his  visit  to  the  feast  of  the  tabernacles 
(Jn  7,2)  one  year  before  (II  312).  Beyschlag  followed  Bleek 
in  this  chronological  shift,  (I  321). 

However,  the  chief  inclination  in  the  course  of  the  life- 
of-Jesus  research  has  been  to  declare  the  incident  unhistorical 
and  assign  to  it  a  purely  symbolic  significance.  The  offense  at 


THE  SOURCES 


169 


its  historicity  was  due  to  the  lack  of  moral  motive  for  such 
an  action ;  its  physical  possibility  would  require  omnipotence ; 
it  conflicts  with  Jesus’  character;  and  Jesus’  disappointment  at 
not  finding  figs  out  of  season  is  too  senseless  to  be  taken  seri¬ 
ously.  Yolkmar,  Neander  (S.  636ff),  Lange,  Keim,  etc.,  saw 
in  the  incident  only  a  symbol  of  the  fate  about  to  befall 
the  Jewish  nation.  That  Me  means  it  all  as  symbolic  is  clear 
to  Yolkmar  in  the  notice,  for  it  was  not  the  season  of  figs. 
Beyschlag  regards  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  as  symbolic  of 
the  destruction  about  to  fall  upon  Jerusalem;  he  cannot  be¬ 
lieve  that  Jesus  came  away  hungry  from  the  hospitable  home 
in  Bethany  (I  401).  Most  recently  A.  Westphal  is  more  hom¬ 
iletic  in  his  symbolization  of  this  parabole  en  action  and  remarks, 
It  is  a  parable  making  clear  to  the  disciples  the  fate  reserved 
for  that  portion  of  humanity  which  would  disappoint  the  hopes 
of  the  Creator  (I  352,  note  3). 

The  chief  argument  against  this  symbolization  of  the 
cursing  of  the  fig  tree  is  that  the  first  two  evangelists  do  not 
seem  to  regard  it  as  such,  for  they  proceed  to  attach  to  it  the 
gnome  concerning  mountain-moving  faith  which  does  not  in 
the  least  suggest  the  imminent  fate  about  to  overtake  either 
Jerusalem  or  the  Jewish  people.  Lc’s  form  of  the  gnome  is 
reported  in  a  very  different  connection,  17,6,  and  is  very  inter¬ 
esting  and  instructive  for  he  drops  the  figure  of  the  mountain 
and  employs  a  variety  of  fig  tree,  cmxdpivo^. 

The  problem  of  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  has  been  solved, 
for  the  most  part,  along  textual-critical  lines  which  lead  back, 
not  to  an  actual  act  of  Jesus,  but  to  a  corruption  of  or  by 
early  Christian  tradition.  Strauss  was  the  pioneer  in  striking 
out  these  lines  which  later  criticism  has  followed  rather  con¬ 
sistently.  The  two  chief  exceptions  belong  to  the  twentieth 
century:  1)  the  eschatological  exposition,  represented  almost 
exclusively  by  Schweitzer ;  2)  the  hard  historicity  of  0.  Holtz- 
mann.  The  latter  writes,  This  nature  miracle  stands  firm  as 
an  historical  fact :  the  fig  tree  that  Jesus  cursed  actually  with¬ 
ered  (WJE,  S.  93).  Jesus’  curse  is  only  the  exasperated  ex¬ 
pression  of  the  discomfort  caused  by  the  hunger  he  suffered. 
In  this  act  Holtzmann  discovers  fine  (P)  human  features  of 


170 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Jesus,  for  he  hungers,  is  mistaken,  disappointed,  and  curses 
a  tree.  He  further  reminds  us  that  it  was  a  tree,  and  not  a 
person,  that  Jesus  curse^. 

Strauss  admitted,  by  way  of  exception  however,  that  no 
Old  Testament  parallels  could  be  cited  after  which  this  miracle 
of  Jesus  was  modelled,  but  he  traced  a  New  Testament  develop¬ 
ment  beginning  with  the  figure  used  by  the  Baptist  (Mt  3,10 
=Lc  3,9),  later  employed  by  Jesus  himself  (Mt  7,19),  still 
later  formulated  into  a  parable  (Lc  13,6-9),  and  last  of  all 
corrupted  into  an  act  of  Jesus  by  early  Christian  tradition; 
Here  we  have  before  us  one  and  the  same  theme  in  three  differ¬ 
ent  forms :  first  in  its  most  concentrated  form  as  a  gnome ,  then 
elaborated  into  a  parable ,  and  finally  converted  into  an  histor¬ 
ical  incident  (Leben  Jesu  1835,  II  251).  Bruno  Bauer  re¬ 
verted  this  process  and  found  that  Lc  had  made  a  parable  out 
of  Mc’s  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  (III  llOff).  Just  recently 
Spitta  has  urged  that  the  themes  of  Me  11,12-14  and  Lc  13,6-9 
are  fundamentally  contradictory;  Lc  omits  the  cursing  of  the 
fig  tree  because  he  did  not  find  it  in  his  sources  (S.  306ff). 
Many,  however,  agree  with  the  opinion  of  Wernle  to  the  effect 
that  Lc  omits  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  because  he  regards  it 
as  a  doublet  or  parallel  of  13,6-9  (SF,  S.  6). 

The  conduct  of  Jesus  in  this  Mt-Mc  incident  of  the  curs¬ 
ing  of  the  fig  tree  is  purely  apocryphal.  It  is  a  miracle  of  pun¬ 
ishment  and  destruction  unparalleled  in  the  canonical  texts  and 
it  contradicts  Jesus’  character  in  the  most  flagrant  fashion. 
Lc  9,52ff  tells  us  that  Jesus  refused  to  allow  fire  to  be  called 
down  from  heaven  upon  an  inhospitable  Samaritan  village  and 
rebuked  his  disciples  for  such  a  suggestion  which  A  C  D  X  0 
.  .  .  .min  a  b  c  f  q  sy  vg  hl  aeth  justify  by  adding  even  as  Elijah 

did.  D  Fw  KM  II  0 . min  lat  syc  vg  hl  add  and  said,  Ye 

know  not  what  manner  of  spirit  ye  are  of  to  Jesus’  reply  which 
Fw  KM  110  ....  min  a  b  c  e  f  q  r  vg  sy  c  vg  hl  bo  arm  further 
elaborate  with  For  the  Son  of  man  came  not  to  destroy  men's 
lives  but  to  save  them  (Huck,  S.  114).  As  Strauss  said  in  this 
connection  it  would  have  been  much  more  like  Jesus  to  restore 
and  revive  a  barren  or  dying  fig  tree  than  to  cause  a  green  one 
to  wither  away  to  the  very  roots. 


THE  SOURCES 


171 


The  variations  in  the  incident  as  reported  by  Me  and  Mt 
are  very  interesting  and  instructive.  The  course  of  the  legend¬ 
ary  process  is  still  discernible  in  the  canonical  sources.  Me  has 
the  disciples  discover  and  remark  upon  the  withered  fig  tree 
only  on  the  day  following  the  curse  pronounced  by  Jesus;  but 
Mt  has  it  wither  away  under  the  very  breath  of  Jesus  and  be¬ 
fore  the  very  eyes  of  the  disciples.  Further  Me  11,12-14  20- 
21  is  an  interpolation  by  the  evangelist  which  breaks  the  pro¬ 
per  logical  order  and  connection  between  Me  11,15-19  and  27- 
3d.  Mt’s  manner  of  insertion  accomplished  by  the  contraction 
of  the  two  separate  elements  of  Me  is  less  disturbing. 

As  a  critical  conclusion  on  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  we 
can  agree  with  the  conclusion  of  Strauss :  In  this  case  the  prize 
belongs  to  the  third  gospel  which  has  preserved  to  usj  separate 
and  pure ,  the  parable  of  the  barren  ouxfj  and  the  tfuxctpivog 
that  can  be  removed  by  faith ,  each  in  its  original  form  and 
meaning  (Leben  Jesu  1835,  II  253). 

The  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  is  apocryphal  and  legendary ; 
as  such  it  can  not  be  ascribed  to  Jesus  for  historico-critical 
reasons  and  can  furnish  no  support  or  matter  for  the  patho- 
graphic  contention. 

g)  The  Cleansing  of  the  Temple  Mt  21,12-17= 

Me  ll,15-19=Lc  19,45-46  (47-48) 

For  Rasmussen  it  would  be  difficult  to  find  a  more  typical 
description  of  an  attack  of  grand  mol  than  is  depicted  in  the 
Gospel  account  of  the  cleansing  of  the  temple.  The  religious 
character  of  the  act  cannot  save  it,  for  it  stands  in  open  con¬ 
tradiction  with  Jesus’  own  teaching  of  forbearance.  It  is  only 
an  outbreak  in  action  against  the  religious  authorities  of  what 
had  formerly  confined  itself  to  outbreaks  in  words.  Here  as 
nowhere  else  in  the  Gospels  Jesus’  awful  affliction  expresses 
itself  in  a  classic  and  clinical  manner  (S.  140f).  De  Loosten 
speaks  of  the  cleansing  of  the  temple  as  a  highly  striking  act 
of  violence  carried  out  in  a  bitter  temper  of  wrath  and  hatred 
(S.  78).  Binet-Sangle  sees  here  one  of  those  dangerous  acts 
frequent  in  mental  alienation.  Whether  it  was  premeditated 
or  spontaneous  is  not  clear,  but  as  all  such  dangerous  acts  it 


172 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


stood  in  direct  relation  with  Jesus’  systematized  delusion  and 
delirium.  It  was  executed  in  an  emotional  state  of  maniacal 
fury.  This  was  an  impulsive  action.  It  was  sudden ,  abrupt , 
explosive ,  executed  like  a  flash  and  should  have  been  followed 
by  a  feeling  of  satisfaction ,  assuagement ,  relief  and  perhaps 
by  a  feeling  of  deep  depression  (IV  213). 

Among  the  early  church  fathers  Origen  reckoned  the 
cleansing  of  the  temple  among  the  greatest  of  Jesus’  miracles. 
But  modern  criticism  has  rejected  this  view,  however,  without 
escaping  certain  difficulties  connected  with  the  incident.  These 
difficulties  have  been  twofold:  1)  chronological;  2)  moral. 

The  chronological  problem  arises  out  of  the  difference 
between  the  Johannine  and  Synoptic  accounts.  In  the  Fourth 
Gospel  the  cleansing  of  the  temple  is  the  inaugural  act  of  Jesus’ 
public  appearance  proper ;  in  the  Synoptics  it  is  among  the 
very  last  of  Jesus’  acts,  being  executed  less  than  a  week  before 
his  death.  Paulus  met  this  chronological  problem  by  accepting 
two  cleansings  of  the  temple,  one  at  the  beginning  and  one  at 
the  very  close  of  Jesus’  public  career  (LJ,  I  1  172ff ;  I  2  86f). 
Since  Strauss  the  alternative  has  been  set  of  rejecting  one  or 
the  other  of  the  accounts  in  the  matter  of  chronology.  Con¬ 
servative  critics  have  favored  the  Johannine  location  (B. 
Weiss).  The  liberals  agree  in  rejecting  the  Fourth  in  favor 
of  the  Synoptic  account  where  Jesus’  act  in  cleansing  the  tem¬ 
ple  seems  to  have  been  the  one  thing  that  so  suddenly  precip¬ 
itated  his  death. 

From  our  present  point  of  view  the  difficulty  is  moral. 
Here  Jesus  acts  with  a  show  of  spirit  that  is  exceptional  for 
him.  Though  the  sources  tell  us  nothing  of  the  emotions  that 
stimulated  or  attended  this  act,  nevertheless  its  execution  could 
not  have  been  without  strong  emotional  antecedents  and  at¬ 
tendants.  In  the  course  of  the  life-of- Jesus  research  the  very 
character  of  the  act  has  led  Jesus’  biographers  to  speak  of  his 
wrath  or  anger  on  this  occasion.  Some  have  been  more  care¬ 
ful  and  toneful  in  their  choice  of  vocabulary  and  have  spoken 
of  Jesus’  righteous  indignation. 

The  majority  of  critics,  less  psychological  in  their  treat¬ 
ment  and  emphasis,  have  felt  a  certain  incongruity  between 


THE  SOURCES 


173 


this  show  of  spirit,  this  aggressiveness  of  action,  and  Jesus’ 
own  teaching  and  the  type  of  conduct  naturally  expected  of 
him. 

Some  have  solved  the  difficulty  by  declaring  the  whole 
scene  unhistorical.  Volkmar  regarded  the  cleansing  of  the 
temple  as  morally  nonsensical  and  physically  inconceivable. 
The  whole  account  is  purely  symbolic.  He  laid  all  stress  on 
i]0§am  He  (Jesus)  cleansed  the  temple  universally  (S.  511ff). 
For  Neander  the  lifted  whip  of  cords  was  never  applied;  it 
was  only  a  symbol.  Besides,  what  could  one  lone  man  do 
against  so  many?  (S.  277). 

Others  declare  themselves  for  the  historicity  of  the  inci¬ 
dent  and  see  Jesus  here  acting  only  in  necessary  accord  with 
his  prophetic  commission  and  consciousness.  The  success  of 
the  act  was  due  to  his  popular  backing,  or  to  the  forcefulness 
of  the  impression  of  his  personality.  Besides  his  act  must  have 
met  with  tremendous  popular  approval.  B.  Weiss  writes, 
Every  pious  Israelite  must  have  approved  in  heart  this  hold 
deed  (II  7).  Bleek  writes,  Thai  those  present  obeyed  his  com¬ 
mand  and  withdrew  with  their  merchandise  is  primarily  to  he 
conceived  as  the  effect  of  the  Lord's  imposing  person  charged 
as  it  was  with  a  holy  earnestness  and  a  prophetic  dignity , 
rather  than  the  effect  of  any  hind  of  application  of  physical 
force  (II  308). 

Other  critics,  pronouncedly  psychological  in  interest  and 
emphasis,  have  Jesus  act  under  the  impulse  of  all  the  stronger 
emotions  that  would  naturally  accompany  such  a  rigorous  and 
revolutionary  step.  Strauss  found  the  act  full  of  passion  and 
threw  doubt  upon  the  holiness  of  Jesus’  wrath  in  its  execution. 
Keim  saw  Jesus  in  the  temple  as  the  revolutionary  Messianic 
zealot.  It  was  his  single  step  into  the  full  possession  of  the 
Messianic  consciousness.  Here  he  is  a  changed  person  and  not 
the  real  Jesus  of  the  new  Galilean  religion.  The  expulsion 
of  the  merchants  is  too  rough  and  ready  to  fit  into  his  gentler 
nature  and  inclination.  This  act  resulted  in  his  being  more 
respected  and  feared  than  loved  in  Jerusalem,  but  it  was  the 
greatest  day  of  his  life  (III  95ff).  O.  Holtzmann  cannot 
conceive  the  cleansing  of  the  temple  as  physically  possible  with- 


174 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


out  an  intervention  of  force  in  which  Jesus  was  supported  by 
his  disciples.  It  was  doubtless  a  regular  battle  in  which  Jesus 
captured  the  outer  court  of  xhe  temple  and  which  he  continued 
to  occupy  (Me  11,16)  throughout  the  day  (LJ,  S.  326).  J. 
Weiss,  on  the  contrary,  sees  Jesus  accomplish  this  feat  alone, 
not  only  unsupported  but  unaccompanied  by  his  disciples. 

Pathographically  the  incident  has  nothing  to  contribute. 
The  whip  of  cords  belongs  to  the  fourth  evangelist.  Among 
the  Synoptics  Mc’s  account  is  the  most  graphic  and  the  fullest 
of  temper,  yet  less  temperamental  and  more  determined,  for 
verse  16  represents  Jesus  as  policing  the  position  he  has  taken. 
(Spitta  regards  this  notice  of  Me  as  a  later  redaction;  S.  309). 
In  the  cleansing  of  the  temple  we  see  Jesus  accepting  and  act¬ 
ing  the  role  of  the  old  prophet.  Had  his  act  in  any  wise  been 
unjustifiable,  his  enemies  would  certainly  never  have  failed  to 
arraign  him  for  it  at  his  trial  where  they  seemed  so  embar¬ 
rassed  for  tenable  testimony.  The  justifiability  of  the  act, 
combined  with  Jesus  thus  challenging  the  authority  of  the 
chief  priests,  seems  more  than  all  else  to  have  spurred  his 
enemies  on  to  as  speedy  a  revenge  as  possible.  Had  this  expul¬ 
sion  of  the  merchants  been  a  real  violation  against  the  temple, 
or  unpopular,  Jesus  would  not  have  been  able  to  appear  daily 
preaching  and  teaching  there.  The  temple  authorities  do  not 
question  the  act  itself,  but  only  request  credentials  for  such 
authority  as  is  clear  from  Me  ll,27ff  (=Mt  21,23ff=Lc  20, 
Iff)  which  is  the  logical  continuation  of  Me  11,18. 

The  only  hope  of  finding  pathographic  matter  in  the 
cleansing  of  the  temple  is  in  the  mind  and  viewpoint  of  the 
pathographer  himself  who  sees  in  the  prophetic  consciousness, 
and  in  all  the  pious  pioneer  souls  of  religion,  only  a  morbid 
psychological  phenomenon.  Against  this  view  of  the  prophetic 
consciousness  the  writer  would  refer  the  reader  to  Dr.  Dieck- 
hoff’s  article,  Her  Prophet  Ezechiel,  in  the  Zeitschrift  fuer  Re¬ 
ligions psychologie  ( Band  7,  Heft  5,  S.  193ff),  in  which  he 
insists  that,  from  the  medical  point  of  view,  it  is  permissible 
to  speak  of  some  of  the  acts,  words  and  experiences  of  the  old 
prophets  as  mistaken,  but  not  as  morbid. 

Regarding  the  purely  psychiatric  judgment  of  conduct 


THE  SOURCES 


175 


and  single  acts  it  is  well  to  cite  the  statements  of  two  authori¬ 
ties.  It  is  well  to  observe  that  the  conclusion  of  the  existence 
of  a  psychic  disorder  cannot  be  drawn  solely  from  conduct 
which  is  without  motive  and  which  cannot  be  sufficiently  ex¬ 
plained  by  psychological  considerations;  in  each  particular  case 
it  must  be  proven  that  morbidly  impulsive  actions  are 
actually  present  which  belong  to  definite  psychoses  clinically 
demonstrable  (Binswanger,  S.  53).  No  isolated  act  can  be 
taken  as  an  infallible  index  of  the  exact  morbid  condition 
(Kraepelin,  S.  95). 

h)  Gethsemane  Mt  26,36-46=Mc  14,32-42=Lc  22,39-46 

Rasmussen  sees  in  the  Gethsemane  scene  a  characteristic 
attack  of  epileptic  petit  mal.  Jesus’  fear  on  this  occasion  is 
morbid  and  is  without  parallel  in  the  life  of  any  healthy-minded 
person  even  when  confronted  with  death  itself.  In  Gethsemane 
Jesus  falls  to  the  ground,  lies  in  agony,  and  vents  himself  in 
fervent  prayer  in  a  purely  psychopathic  manner.  That  his 
fear  is  morbid  is  clear  from  the  fact  that  it  as  suddenly  disap¬ 
pears  as  it  appears;  healthy  fear  continues  till  the  danger  is 
past  (S.  138f).  De  Loosten  finds  that  Jesus’  agony  in  Gethse¬ 
mane,  though  attended  by  visions,  brings  him  down  from  his 
delirium  to  a  fairly  normal  state  of  soul.  It  is  only  with  his 
command  to  Peter  to  put  up  his  sword  (Mt  26,52-54)  that 
Jesus’  delirium  breaks  forth  again  with  all  of  its  old  force; 
with  these  words  he  came  to  himself  again  (S.  82ff).  Binet- 
Sangle  also  finds  Jesus’  fear  on  this  night  morbid  because  of 
its  intense  physiological  concomitants,  its  lack  of  sufficient 
reason,  and  its  extreme  persistency.  In  Gethsemane  Jesus  suf¬ 
fers  a  vaso-motoric  attack  attended  by  facial  hematidrosia 
fundamentally  due  to  diseased  and  disordered  nerves  and  par¬ 
ticularly  occasioned  by  exposure  to  the  chill  and  damp  of  the 
night  air.  The  figure  of  the  cup  and  the  appearance  of  the 

(In  volume  I,  page  252f,  Binet-Sangle  says  that  the  agony  of  Jesus  in 
Gethsemane  presents  all  the  characteristics  of  a  morbid  emotion;  one  of 
the  three  which  he  cites  from  Fere  is  that  such  an  emotion  is  without  suf¬ 
ficient  reason  or  is  entirely  unfounded.  In  IV  355  he  proceeds  to  contra¬ 
dict  himself  and  seems  to  have  forgotten  what  he  wrote  in  volume  I,  for 
he  says:  La  cause  occasionnelle  de  son  attaque  d’angoisse  fut  la  crainte 
justifi6e  du  supplice  qui  Vattendait) , 


17  6 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


angel  are  visual  hallucinations.  The  depressed  and  agitated 
state  of  consciousness  in  which  Jesus  found  himself  is  morbid. 
The  Gethsemane  scene  alone  is  sufficient  to  prove  that  the 
founder  of  the  Christian  religion  was  a  mental  degenerate  (I 
250-288). 

In  the  history  of  Christian  thought  the  scene  in  Gethse¬ 
mane  has  been  problematic  for  theological  and  christological 
rather  than  for  historical  and  critical  reasons.  The  theolog¬ 
ical  solution  began  with  the  Fourth  Gospel  which  does  not  re¬ 
port  the  scene ;  but  that  this  solution  by  omission  was  not  sat¬ 
isfactory  is  evident  in  the  theological  literature  since,  both  the 
early  and  the  late. 

In  view  of  the  pathographic  contention  our  interest  in  the 
scene  is  psychological  and  critical.  Does  Jesus  here  manifest 
morbid  emotions?  In  order  to  be  morbid,  his  fear  on  this  oc¬ 
casion  must  be  ungrounded  or  without  sufficient  objective 
reason.  The  ground  for  healthy  fear  must  lie  either  in  the 
immediate  antecedents  or  in  the  anticipation  of  what  is  about 
to  come ;  the  greater  the  proximity  of  the  antecedents  or  the  an¬ 
ticipated  fate  the  greater  the  impression  upon  the  imagination 
and  the  more  intense  the  fear.  Jesus’  fear  in  Gethsemane  is 
fully  justified  in  the  antecedents  and  in  the  immediate  conse¬ 
quences.  The  critical  course  of  the  Jerusalem  contentions,  the 
desperate  bitterness  of  the  religious  authorities,  and  the  deser¬ 
tion  of  a  regular  disciple  would  lead  a  man  of  any  discernment 
whatever  to  know  that  the  climax  had  been  reached  and  that 
his  hour  had  struck.  Further,  Jesus’  fear  is  justified  by  what 
follows,  for  before  he  can  leave  the  place  of  prayer  he  is  ar¬ 
rested;  his  former  disciple  had  served  as  guide.  Had  the  arrest 
not  taken  place,  and  had  Jesus  enjoyed  liberty  for  a  consider¬ 
able  subsequent  period,  then  one  might  begin  to  speak  of  his 
ungrounded  fear  in  Gethsemane.  But  the  acutest  anticipations 
of  Jesus’  agonized  soul  during  this  last  night  realized  them¬ 
selves  with  the  greatest  possible  speed,  for  before  sundown  of 
the  following  dawn  he  hung  dead  on  the  cross. 

That  Jesus  foresaw  his  passion  and  death  in  all  the  details 
as  the  three  prophecies,  Me  8,31  ;  9,31  ;  10,32,  represent  is  very 
doubtful,  for  they  are  clearly  modelled  after  the  passion  story 


THE  SOURCES 


177 


itself.  But  that  Jesus  spoke  of  his  end  as  a  cup  to  be  drunk 
or  a  baptism  with  which  he  was  to  be  baptized  (Me  10,38f= 
Mt  20,22f=Lc  12,50a)  is  highly  probable.  But  thus  to  speak 
with  composure  of  his  end  which  was  yet  far  ahead  in  the  future 
and  while  he  was  yet  far  from  Jerusalem  is  quite  a  different 
thing  from  facing  it  as  less  than  twenty-four  hours  away. 
There  is  nothing  morbid  in  Jesus’  emotions  in  Gethsemane ; 
under  the  circumstances  his  state  of  soul  is  perfectly  natural. 
The  contrast  of  Jesus’  conduct  during  his  last  night  with  that 
of  Socrates  has  been  drawn  since  the  beginning  of  early  Chris¬ 
tian  tradition,  and  to  the  disadvantage  of  Jesus.  It  is  true 
that  Jesus  was  not  stoic  in  his  view  of  suffering,  neither  in  the 
case  of  others  nor  in  his  own  case.  But  the  normal  and  natural 
emotions  of  the  healthy-minded  person  in  an  hour  when  death 
seems  certain  are  those  of  Jesus  and  not  those  of  Socrates.  It 
was  a  no  less  distinguished  thinker  than  Kant  who  pronounced 
stoic  morality  pathological  because  it  set  the  springs  of  duty 
elsewhere  than  in  the  pure  moral  law  of  conscience  ( Kritik  der 
pralctischen  Vernunft ,  Reclam  1111-1112,  S.  101). 

In  Gethsemane  we  see  Jesus  taking;  serious  things  seri- 
ously.  His  emotions  are  not  only  normal  and  natural,  but  his 
assembly  of  volitional  powers  and  his  decisions  are  of  such  a 
high  order  and  so  unselfish  that  they  are  heroic  in  the  noblest 
sense.  C’h.  H.  Weisse  made  a  pertinent  point  in  this  connec¬ 
tion  when  he  wrote:  It  is  a  well  established  fact  of  psychology 
that  just  the  uncertainty  concerning  external  details  in  par¬ 
ticular ,  even  when  a  presentiment  and  inner  certainty  concern¬ 
ing  the  approach  of  a  fateful  hour  is  felt  in  general,  can  pro¬ 
duce  such  an  agony  of  soul  in  a  character  completely  composed 
and  sure  of  itself  (I  612). 

The  critical  side  of  the  Gethsemane  scene  has  to  do  chiefly 
with  Lc’s  account.  Lc  has  very  r 
can  account,  and  doubtless  for  the  reason,  as  Wernle  suggests 
(SF,  S.  33),  that  the  early  Christian  community  was  begin¬ 
ning  to  take  offense  at  this  deep  humiliation  of  Jesus.  That 
there  is  tenable  truth  in  this  view  is  evident  from  the  tendency 
of  the  fourth  evangelist  to  strip  all  struggle  from  the  life  of 
Jesus;  he  leaves  only  the  most  ragged  and  hardly  recognizable 


adically  abbreviated  the  Mar- 


178 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


remnant  of  the  Gethsemane  struggle  in  12,27  and  18,11. 
Spitta  throws  doubt  upon  the  historicity  of  the  whole  Gethse¬ 
mane  scene  because  he  fails  to  find  in  it  traces  of  the  original 
Synoptic  document  ( Grundschrift )  ;  bur  present  Lc  has  bor¬ 
rowed  the  scene  from  Me  perhaps  under  the  influence  of  Heb 
5,7ff  (S.  388ff). 

The  special  point  of  interest  in  Lc’s  account  for  us  here 
is  found  in  verses  43-44:  And  there  appeared  unto  him  an 
angel  from  heaven ,  strengthening  him.  And  being  in  an  agony 
he  prayed  more  earnestly;  and  his  sweat  became  as  it  were  great 
drops  of  blood  falling  down  upon  the  ground.  Attempts  to 
defend  the  literal  historicity  of  these  two  verses  have  not  been 
unknown.  Yenturini  has  Mary  play  the  role  of  the  angel;  It 
was  Mary  who ,  as  an  angel  of  God ,  appeared  here  in  the  bitter 
struggle  to  comfort  the  magnificent  martyr  (IV  96).  Regard¬ 
ing  the  sweating  of  blood  some  have  spoken  of  a  physical  indis¬ 
position  of  Jesus  on  this  particular  night.  Binet-Sangle  con¬ 
firms  this  phenomenon  from  the  medical  point  of  view  and  cites 
sixteen  cases  of  hematidrosia  among  mystics  (I  261-275).  But 
such  naturalistic  and  medical  methods  are  futile  and  unneces¬ 
sary  from  the  angle  of  textual  criticism. 

Regarding  the  appearance  of  the  aiding  angel  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  Lc  is  specially  fond  of  these  angelophanies 
(See  l,llf;  l,26ff;  2,9-15;  Acts  1,10;  5,19;  12,7;  16,9;  22, 
17f ;  23,11).  Bruno  Bauer  found  that  Lc  has  the  angel  appear 
at  the  wrong  time  for  Jesus  must  pray  still  more  earnestly 
after  this  divine  reinforcement  (III  251).  Paulus  found  the 
sweating  of  blood  merely  a  philological  miracle  ( bloss  ein  philo- 
logisches  Wunder;  EHB,  IV  563). 

No  two  verses  of  the  canonical  Gospels  have  a  weaker  lit¬ 
erary  and  textual  basis  than  Lc  22,43-44.  They  are  not  only 
peculiar  to  the  third  Gospel,  but  they  are  not  found  in  the 
majority  of  its  best  texts.  They  are  missing  in  Alepha  A  B 
N  R  T  W  13-69-124-788-826-579  f  sys  sa  bo;  they  are  found 
in  Aleph*  D  L  Q  X  0  .  .min  lat  sydl  c  vg  hl  arm  aeth  (Huck, 
S.  197).  Even  B.  Weiss  regards  them  as  so  uncertain  that 
he  neglects  them  entirely. 

Further,  no  two  verses  of  the  canonical  Gospels  have  been 


THE  SOURCES 


179 


more  unanimously  assigned  by  critics  to  legend,  myth,  or  apoc¬ 
ryphal  addition,  or  dogmatic  invention  than  these  two  verses. 
Volkmar  writes:  Luke’s  embellishment  of  his  excerpt  from 
Me  had  received  such  an  apocryphal  character  that  at  a  very 
early  date  there  was  a  desire  to  expunge  Lc  22,43-14  (S.  576). 
On  this  apocryphal  addition  of  Lc  Reville  remarks :  The  first 
notice  possesses  an  aesthetic  and  symbolic  value ,  the  beauty  of 
which  is  incontestable ,  but  the  second  is  manifestly  an  exag¬ 
geration  (II  337). 

The  original  author  of  Lc  verse  44  sees  Jesus’  agony  in 
Gethsemane  as  an  anticipation  of  his  suffering  on  the  cross; 
the  first  drops  of  blood  were  not  shed  on  the  cross,  but  were 
sweat  in  Gethsemane.  The  verse  as  a  whole  is  written  in  the 
light  of  the  significance  attached  by  the  early  Christian  thought 
to  Jesus’  suffering  and  shed  blood.  The  whole  of  Lc’s  scene 
in  Gethsemane  is  simply  a  prelude  to  the  great  tragedy  of  the 
cross. 

In  conclusion:  Jesus’  fear  or  agony  in  Gethsemane  is  not 
morbid  in  a  psychopathic,  or  any  other  sense ;  Lc’s  addition  in 
verses  43-44  is  to  be  rejected  as  apocryphal.  The  pathographer 

must  seek  elsewhere  for  his  materials. 

Of  the  biographical  incidents  as  a  whole  that  have  figured  in  the  con¬ 
tentions  against  Jesus’  psychic  health  Weber  says,  They  are  the  strong  yet 
normal  reactions  of  a  'psychically  vigorous  man  to  perturbing  events  im¬ 
portant  for  his  thought  and  life  task  (Sp.  234). 


CHAPTER  V 


The  Personality  of  Jesus  from  the  Pathographic 

Point  of  View 

We  now  leave  off  the  more  detailed  study  of  particular 
words  of  Jesus  and  incidents  in  his  public  career  and  turn  to 
the  study  of  his  personality  as  a  whole.  Here,  again,  our  study 
is  not  exhaustive  in  any  sense  of  the  word.  We  are  interested 
only  in  those  features  of  Jesus’  personality  that  have  figured 
in  the  pathographic  contention.  It  is  Rasmussen  who,  more 
than  all  others,  though  none  neglect  it  entirely,  has  undertaken 
to  show  that  Jesus  was  a  psychopathic  personality.  For  the 
convenience  of  approach  to  this  problem  we  shall  undertake  to 
investigate  .in  order  Jesus’  conduct,  his  character,  and  his  con¬ 
sciousness  as  represented  in  the  sources. 

1)  His  Conduct 

One  important  factor  in  determining  the  state  of  a  man’s 
mind  as  healthy  or  morbid  is  the  understanding  of  the  motives 
for  his  actions.  Why  does  he  do  certain  things  that  he  does? 
If  his  conduct  is  usual  and  normal  the  question  of  his  sanity 
never  occurs  to  anyone.  If  his  actions  are  unusual  and  strik¬ 
ing,  yet  we  can  nevertheless  see  that  the  occasions  are  so  unusual 
as  to  demand  conduct  of  a  striking  character,  no  question  of 
his  psychic  soundness  arises.  It  is  only  when  we  see  an  incon¬ 
gruity  between  occasion  and  conduct,  between  cause  and  effect, 
that  we  must  conclude  that  the  real  reason  for  a  man’s  conduct 
lies  elsewhere  than  in  the  occasion  itself,  that  he  is  stimulated 
to  such  incongruous  conduct  by  some  sort  of  nervous  disorder 
or  psychic  derangement.  If  his  actions  are  without  sufficient 
reason  or  wholly  unmotived,  we  are  then  sure  that  he  is  the 
victim  of  some  psychic  malady. 

The  conduct  of  Jesus  on  three  particular  occasions,  the 

180 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


181 


cleansing  of  the  temple,  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree  and  in  Geth- 
semane,  has  already  been  discussed.  Here  we  have  to  do  with 
a  more  general  characterization  of  Jesus’  conduct  as  a  whole. 
Rasmussen  speaks  of  the  vagabond  restlessness  of  Jesus  which 
causes  him  now  to  seek  out  the  thoroughfares,  again  to  retreat 
to  the  solitude  of  the  mountains  or  the  desert.  For  Binet- 
Sangle  the  itinerary  of  Jesus  is  only  the  chronic  vagabondage 
and  the  peregrinations  of  a  paranoiac,  the  ambulomania  of  a 
theomegalomaniac  (IV  79-188). 

The  chronology  and  geographical  itinerary  of  Jesus’  pub¬ 
lic  career  is  one  of  the  chief  problems  in  the  life  of  Jesus.  Most 
scholars  regard  it  as  insoluble  and  declare  that  a  life  or  bio¬ 
graphy  of  Jesus  is  an  historical  impossibility  because  the 
source  material  is  inadequate  to  the  task.  The  attempts  at  an 
historical  reconstruction  of  the  life  of  Jesus  fall  into  three 
main  classes:  1)  those  in  which  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  taken 
as  the  historical  ground-work  into  which  the  Synoptic  mater¬ 
ials  are  fitted  as  represented  by  B.  Weiss  (most  recently  by 
W  estphal  and  Lepsius)  and  by  practically  all  of  the  lives  of 
Jesus  before  Strauss;  2)  those  in  which  ..the  Fourth  Gospel 
is  excluded  as  a  reliable  source  and  Me  is  taken  as  the  historical 
framework  into  which  the  non-Marcan  matter  of  Mt  and  Lc 
is  ingeniously  inserted  as  represented  by  O.  Holtzmann ;  3) 

the  eschatological  reconstruction  of  A.  Schweitzer  in  which  all 
of  Jesus’  words  and  deeds  are  interpreted  and  resolved  into 
eschatological  addresses,  acts,  and  sacraments.  Over  against 
all  of  these  attempts  stands  the  source-scepticism  of  Wrede 
and  Wellhausen. 

The  hope  of  a  reconstruction  of  the  historical  plan  of  the 
chronology  and  course  of  Jesus’  public  career  on  the  basis  of 
the  Fourth  Gospel  is  impossible  in  spite  of  the  three  volumes 
of  B.  Weiss.  Binet-Sangle’s  series  of  flights,  campaigns  about 
the  sea  of  Tiberias,  and  attempts  on  Jerusalem  (II’  121-179) 
are  historical  fiction.  Mt  and  Lc  are  too  composite  and  com¬ 
plicated  in  their  arrangements  of  the  sources  which  they  em¬ 
ploy  to  make  the  task  much  easier.  Me,  because  of  his  narra¬ 
tive  character  and  the  relative  simplicity  of  his  composition  in 
so  far  as  sources  are  concerned,  furnishes  us  with  materials 


182 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


that  render  possible  only  the  most  modest  and  tentative  histor¬ 
ical  plan  of  Jesus’  public  career  as  a  working  hypothesis  for 
the  understanding  of  some  otherwise  inexplicable  incidents  in 
the  life  of  Jesus,  particularly  with  reference  to  the  problem 
of  his  Messianic  consciousness.  Even  from  Me  about  all  that 
we  can  say  with  certainty  regarding  the  chronology  and  course 
of  Jesus’  public  career  is  that  by  far  the  greater  half  of  Jesus’ 
public  ministry  had  its  scene  in  Galilee  and  centered  about  the 
sea  of  Tiberias  with  headquarters  in  Capernaum ;  Jesus  under¬ 
took  two  important  journeys,  one  to  the  north  (7,24)  and  the 
fatal  journey  to  Jerusalem.  There  was  only  one  chief  shift 
of  scene,  from  Galilee  to  Jerusalem,  and  the  length  of  Jesus’ 
activity  in  the  capital  was  not  more  than  a  few  days.  The 
whole  of  Jesus’  public  career  is  to  be  reckoned,  not  in  years, 
but  in  months,  perhaps  only  in  weeks. 

So  much  for  a  general  orientation  concerning  the  chron¬ 
ology  and  course  of  Jesus’  public  career.  We  now  turn  to  the 
sources,  particularly  to  Me,  for  the  moral  motivations  back 
of  the  migrations  of  Jesus  and  the  significant  steps  he  takes. 
But  it  is  just  at  this  point  of  moral  motivation  for  Jesus’  acts 
that  the  Gospels  leave  us  most  consistently  in  the  dark. 

The  evangelists  seem  to  feel  a  greater  obligation  to  tell  us 
when,  where,  why,  and  to  whom  Jesus  saj^s  certain  things  than 
they  do  to  tell  us  why  Jesus  does  certain  things  that  he  does  or 
takes  certain  steps  that  he  takes.  Sometimes  the  Synoptists 
agree  on  the  scene,  setting,  occasion  and  audience  of  certain 
of  Jesus’  discourses;  more  often  they  disagree  in  one  or  the 
other,  or  in  all.  This  goes  to  show  that  scenes,  settings,  occa¬ 
sions  and  audiences  are  usually  independently  supplied  or  in¬ 
vented  by  the  evangelists  themselves.  Mt  and  Lc  feel  at  per¬ 
fect  literary  liberty  in  these  matters.  Mt  in  particular  seems 
anxious  to  give  the  scenes,  setting,  occasions  and  audience  for 
certain  of  Jesus’  words,  for  he  breaks  up  his  Q  material  and 
scatters  it  throughout  the  Marcan  order  attaching  it  wherever 
he  believes  he  finds  a  suitable  setting  or  connection.  Lc  is  less 
concerned  in  this  regard,  for  he  inserts  his  Q  material  and 
special  matter  in  two  places  in  Mc’s  order,  the  lesser  interpo¬ 
lation  after  Me  3,19,  the  larger  interpolation  after  Me  9,50. 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


183 


But  independent  of  Mc’s  order  Mt  and  Lc  usually  supply  some 
sort  of  scene  or  connection  for  most  of  Jesus’  words.  Mt 
groups  his  Lord’s  prayer  topically  in  his  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
(6,5-15)  ;  Lc  does  not  include  his  Lord’s  prayer  in  his  Sermon 
on  the  Plain  (6,17-19),  but  reports  it  in  quite  a  different  form 
than  Mt  and  supplies  a  specific  occasion  on  which  Jesus  gives 
the  Lord’s  prayer  in  response  to  a  request  on  the  part  of  the 
disciples  (ll,lff).  This  would  all  go  to  show,  as  Wernle 
suggests,  that  the  acts  of  Jesus  were  far  less  significant  in  the 
religious  life  of  the  early  Christian  community  than  were  his 
words  which  seem  to  have  had  a  catechetical  importance. 

This  is  at  once  clear  when  we  turn  to  the  acts  and  conduct 
of  Jesus.  Here  we  find  that  Jesus’  moves  and  steps,  particu¬ 
larly  during  his  Galilean  days,  are  unconnected,  unprepared, 
and  unmotived  both  in  what  precedes  and  what  follows.  Mc’s 
narration  of  events  is  graphic,  but  he  gives  us  no  connected 
biography.  He  supplies  no  motivations  that  help  us  from  one 
incident  or  step  to  the  other.  Of  Jesus’  activity  in  Galilee  we 
have  only  a  series  of  unrelated  anecdotes,  with  the  exception 
of  the  famous  day  in  Capernaum  (Me  1,21-38).  The  account 
is  chaotic.  What  leads  Jesus  from  one  place  to  another  and 
how  long  the  intervening  gap  was  we  are  not  told.  A  good 
illustration  of  this  is  the  section  Me  6,30-8,26  which  J.  Weiss 
calls  a  topographical  jumble  that  is  hardly  to  he  untangled 
(AeE,  S.  205).  Me  has  the  scene  shift  not  less  than  thirty 
times  before  Jesus  reaches  Jerusalem  and  not  once  does  he  tell 
us  why. 

Still  more  serious  is  Mc’s  omission  or  neglect  of  moral 
motivation  for  certain  decisive  steps  taken  by  Jesus.  In  1, lb- 
20  Me  has  Jesus  call  his  first  disciples  without  telling  us  of 
any  previous  contact  or  personal  acquaintance.  Such  questions 
as  how  Jesus  knows  that  these  two  sets  of  brothers  are  just 
the  men  he  wants  as  his  permanent  companions,  or  what  it  is 
that  induces  these  fishermen  to  give  up  their  occupation  and 
follow  a  total  stranger,  do  not  occur  to  Me.  It  is  the  second 
question  that  is  specially  problematic  for  Lc  who  meets  it  by 
having  the  calling  of  the  first  disciples  follow  the  eventful  day 
in  Capernaum  and  Simon’s  house  and  by  modifying  the  whole 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


184 

account  of  the  calling  as  he  does  in  5,1-11  where  Jesus  preaches, 
from  Simon’s  boat,  gives  instruction  f^r  the  miraculous  catch 
of  fishes,  and  then  calls  the  first  disciples.  The  fourth  evangel¬ 
ist’s  representation  of  a  previous  personal  contact  between 
Jesus  and  his  first  disciples,  perhaps  occasioned  by  the  preach¬ 
ing  of  the  Baptist  at  the  Jordan,  has  historical  probability  in 
its  favor.  But  Lc’s  transposition  and  modification  of  Me  1, 
16-20  shows  itself  to  be  only  his  way  of  meeting  a  problem 
neglected  b}^  Me  and  adds  nothing  to  our  historical  informa¬ 
tion/ 

In  7,24  Me  has  Jesus  suddenly  break  camp  and  move  rapid¬ 
ly  to  the  north  without  telling  us  why  Jesus  goes,  how  long  he 
is  there,  or  what  prompts  him  to  return  to  Galilee  again.  The 
Fourth  Gospel  makes  no  mention  of  this  journey  and  never 
has  Jesus  farther  north  «than  the  sea  of  Galilee.  This  journey 
is  a  part  of  Lc’s  great  omission  of  Marcan  matter,  6,45-8,26 ; 
m  the  third  Gospel  Jesus  never  crosses  the  borders  of  native 
land  and  is  never  farther  north  than  Caesarea  Philippi. 

This  journey  to  the  north  marks  one  of  the  most  import¬ 
ant  and  significant  steps  in  Jesus’  public  career.  Whole  lives 
of  Jesus  have  been  shaped  and  colored  by  the  understanding 
of  this  one  journey.  In  many  lives  of  Jesus  Me  7,24  marks 
the  second  historical  period  in  Jesus’  public  ministry.  Me 
gives  us  no  answer  to  the  question,  Why  did  Jesus  go  north? 
The  motives  have  therefore  been  supplied  by  the  imagination 
of  Jesus’  biographers  and  the  answers  have  been  legion.  1) 
The  old  view  was  that  Jesus  went  north  in  order  to  be  alone  with 
his  disciples.  It  was  a  period  in  which  Jesus  gives  up  his 
public  activity  and  devotes  himself  to  the  private  training  of 
the  twelve.  He  instructs  them  in.  a  purely  spiritual  view  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  in  order  to  prepare  them  for  the  tragic  events 
soon  to  follow.  2)  Loisy  and  others  see  here  a  forced  flight 
of  Jesus.  The  growing  opposition  of  the  religious  authorities 
compel  Jesus  to  surrender  the  early  scene  of  his  popular  suc¬ 
cess.  There  had  been  a  change  in  public  sentiment  as  well  since 
the  return  of  the  twelve.  Jesus  must  wait  in  the  north  for 
the  psychological  moment  (the  Passover)  in  order  to  proceed 
to  Jerusalem.  3)  Spitta  and  Burkitt  see  here  a  flight  before 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


185 


Herod  Antipas.  Jesus  is  a  fugitive  from  justice;  he  flees  in 
order  to  avoid  the  fate  of  his  great  forerunner,  (Mauren- 
brecher  combines  2  and  3).  4)  A.  Schweitzer  fits  the  north¬ 

ern  journey  into  his  eschatological  scheme  and  sketch.  Ever 
since  the  return  of  the  twelve  Jesus  had  tried  to  get  away 
from  the  people,  and  in  his  sojourn  to  the  region  of  Tyre  and 
Sidcn  he  accomplishes  the  escape  from  the  pressing  popularity 
with  the  people  which  he  had  failed  to  accomplish  by  his  cross¬ 
ings  and  recrossings  of  Tiberias.  Jesus  goes  north  in  order 
to  remain  unknown  and  to  preserve  his  incognito ;  he  thus  pre¬ 
vents  a  premature  betrayal  of  his  identity.  5)  According  to 
still  another  view  Jesus  goes  north  for  no  outward  or  external 
reason,  but  for  purely  internal  reasons.  It  is  a  period  of 
rest  and  retirement  from  public  activity  during  which  Jesus 
passes  through  subjective  struggles  for  clearness  and  certainty 
as  to  the  role  that  he  is  to  play  personally  in  the  coming  king¬ 
dom  ;  this  period  ends  in  the  eventful  confession  at  Caesarea 
Philippi. 

In  conclusion  we  can  say  that  Me  furnishes  us  no  motives 
or  reasons  for  Jesus’  journey  to  the  north.  And  any  attempt 
at  a  reconstruction  is  a  reading  into  the  text  and  not  a  reading 
of  the  text;  it  is  a  conjecture  supported  only  by  the  point  of 
view  of  the  biographer.  For  some  unknown  reason,  or  reasons, 
Jesus  suddenly  breaks  up  his  ministry  in  Galilee  and  proceeds 
to  the  north.  How  long  he  remained  there,  what  his  activities, 
experiences  and  decisions  were  during  this  period  we  do  not 
know.  But  that  it  was  eventful  is  clear  from  the  fact  that  at 
its  close  Jesus  strikes  in  on  an  entirely  new  course  of  action, 
bis  thought  has  developed  out  in  a  new  direction,  and  a  more 
serious  tone  has  found  its  way  into  his  words. 

The  motives  or  reasons  for  Jesus’  decision  to  go  to  Jeru¬ 
salem  (Me  10,lff=Mt  19,lff=Lc  9?51ff)  are  no  better 
known  to  us  than  those  for  his  northern  journey.  However, 
we  can  better  perhaps  limit  the  extent  of  the  reasons  that  de¬ 
termined  Jesus  upon  this  journey  than  upon  that  of  Me  7,24. 
In  the  journey  to  the  north  we  are  not  at  all  sure  whether  the 
motives  are  objective  or  subjective.  But  we  are  fairly  safe- 
in  saying  that  the  Jerusalem  journey  was  the  result  of  reasons 


18  6 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


and  motives  within  the  mind  and  consciousness  of  Jesus.  It  is 
difficult  to  assign  any  external  motive  for  the  journey  to  Jeru¬ 
salem  other  than  Jesus’  desire  to  attend  the  Passover  and  in¬ 
tention  to  return  to  Galilee  and  continue  his  ministry.  As 
Schweitzer  has  said  (GdLJF,  S.  437,  Anm.  1)  the  lives  of 
Jesus  that  have  been  written  might  be  divided  into  two  classes 
according  as  they  have  Jesus  go  to  Jerusalem  to  continue  his 
work  there  (Reimarus,  Strauss,  Brandt,  Loisy)  or  to  die 
(Weisse,  A.  Schweitzer,  etc.). 

But  when  we  come  to  read  the  Synoptic  sources  we  find  that 
no  reason  is  given  for  this  journey  of  Jesus.  The  exact  plan 
that  Jesus  had  in  mind  in  undertaking  this  move  is  not  at  all 
clear  to  us.  We  are  not  even  certain  that  Jesus  had  any  defin¬ 
ite  plan  in  mind.  The  prophecies  of  the  passion  make  it  clear 
that  the  Synoptists  regard  it  as  a  journey  to  death,  but  that 
they  actually  represent  the  thoughts  and  motives  of  Jesus  him¬ 
self  is  a  very  different  question.  We  can  simply  say  that  here  as 
elsewhere  Me  leaves  us  to  guess  and  conjecture  as  to  why 
Jesus  makes  certain  important  moves  that  he  makes. 

This  lack  of  moral  motivation  in  Me  is  not  peculiar  to 
Jesus’  conduct  alone,  but  is  generally  true  of  the  conduct  of 
all  the  characters  that  figure  in  his  narrative.  The  series  of 
contentions,  2, 1-3, 6,  is  simply  a  topical  grouping  of  Mc’s  own 
making,  for  there  is  no  necessary  chronological  connection  be¬ 
tween  these  five  incidents.  The  league  of  the  Pharisees  and  the 
Herodians  in  3,6  with  the  intent  of  destroying  Jesus  comes  like 
a  flash  of  lightning  out  of  a  clear  sky.  Me  3,6  is  not  properly 
motived  in  anything  that  Jesus  has  said  or  done.  Jesus’  con¬ 
duct  is  unconventional,  but  there  is  not  the  slightest  ground 
for  a  determination  upon  his  death.  The  same  is  true  of  Lc 
4,28-30  where  Lc  has  the  people  of  Nazareth  actually  make 
an  attempt  upon  Jesus’  life  at  his  very  first  public  appearance, 
although  he  has  said  or  done  nothing  in  the  synagogue  (Lc 
4,16-27)  on  this  occasion  that  would  justify  such  wrath  and 
wickedness.  Me  and  Mt  have  Jesus  in  Nazareth  much  later 
in  his  Galilean  career  but  there  he  encounters  only  unbelief 
(Me  6,l-6=Mt  13,54-58).  Besides  Me  has  Jesus  open  his 
public  career  in  Capernaum  (1,21-38),  and  Lc’s  shift  of  the 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


187 


scene  to  Nazareth  is  still  evident  in  Lc’s  own  account  (1,23) 
where  he  has  Jesus  refer  to  the  things  he  has  done  in  Caper¬ 
naum  although  Lc  has  not  told  us  before  that  Jesus  had  been 
there.  Lc’s  opening  sermon  in  Nazareth  is  simply  a  transposi¬ 
tion  of  the  Marcan  order  and  a  modification  of  the  Marcan 
account  in  favor  of  his  dogmatic  bias  to  the  end  of  showing 
that  Jesus  was  from  the  very  outset  rejected  by  his  own  people 
and  must  go  to  the  Gentiles.  The  inaugural  rejection  in  Naz¬ 
areth  is  for  Lc  symbolic  of  Jesus’  final  rejection  by  his  own 
nation. 

The  greatest  moral  mystery  of  the  Gospels  is  the  conduct 
of  that  disciple  who  betrayed  Jesus  into  the  hands  of  his  ene¬ 
mies.  After  reading  the  name  of  Judas  as  the  last  in  the  cata¬ 
logue  of  the  twelve  in  Me  3,19  (— Mt  10,4=Lc  6,16)  we  never 
hear  of  him  again  until  14,10f  (=Mt  26,14ff=Lc  22,3ff) 
where  he  is  in  the  very  act  of  betraying  Jesus.  Judas’  name 
never  figures  again  in  Me  or  Lc  except  in  the  scene  at  the  arrest 
(Me  14,43ff=Mt  26, 47ff=Lc  22,47ff).  Mt  26,25  has  Jesus 
definitely  designate  Judas  as  the  traitor  and  tells  us  of  his 
fate  in  27,3-10  (Compare  Acts  1,16-20).  Me  makes  no  effort 
at  all  to  prepare  us  for  the  shock  that  comes  in  14,10f  when 
one  of  Jesus’  selected  twelve  turns  against  him  and  brings  about 
his  death. 

The  Judas-Jesus  problem  is  as  old  and  older  than  the  Fourth 
Gospel  in  which  the  problem  is  clearly  felt  and  no  effort  is 
spared  to  blacken  the  character  of  Judas  and  have  Jesus  know 
from  the  very  beginning  who  should  betray  him  (6,64  70-71; 
12,4-6;  13,2;  13,10-11  18-19;  13,21-30;  17,12;  18, Iff). 
These  two  lines  struck  out  by  the  fourth  evangelist  have  been 
followed  even  down  through  the  great  modern  lives  of  Jesus 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  Not  one  has  left  the  two  problems 
untouched,  namely:  Why  did  Judas  betray  Jesus?  and,  How 
did  it  happen  that  Jesus  was  so  unfortunate  as  to  select  such 
a  man  as  Judas  as  one  of  his  intimate  disciples?  It  is  not  the 
place  here  to  review  all  the  answers  in  their  wide  variety  that 
have  been  given  by  Paulus,  Hase,  A.  K.  Emmerich,  Noack, 
Renan,  Brandt,  etc.  The  most  interesting  turn  of  the  prob¬ 
lem  is  that  given  by  A.  Schweitzer  (GdLJF,  S.  441ff)  who  in- 


188 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


sists  that  it  is  not  WHY  Judas  betrayed  Jesus,  but 
WHAT  (1)  he  betrayed.  But  all  suggested  solutions 
of  the  Judas- Jesus  problem  are  historical  reconstructions 
that  have  no  verified  basis  in  the  Synoptic  sources.  We  must 
admit  with  Bruno  Bauer  that  the  sources  offer  us  no  means  of 
solving  the  problem.  Me  tells  us  nothing  of  the  character  of 
Judas,  nothing  of  the  circumstances  of  his  calling,  and  gives 
not  the  slightest  indication  of  the  motives  that  led  to  his  be¬ 
trayal  of  Jesus. 

Reviewing,  then,  this  lack  of  moral  motivation,  not  only  for 
the  conduct  of  Jesus  at  important  junctures  in  his  public 
career,  but  for  the  conduct  of  Jesus’  contemporaries  and  the 
other  characters  of  Mc’s  Gospel  we  can  see  clearly  that  it  is 
due  to  the  unconnected,  chaotic,  reminiscent  and  anecdotal 
character  of  Mc’s  Gospel  where  the  whole  interest  centers  in 
what  Jesus  and  others  do,  but  not  in  w  h  y  he  or  they  do  it. 
The  second  book  of  the  New  Testament  is  not  a  history  or 
biography  in  the  modern  sense,  for  there  is  in  it  no  modern 
interest  in  the  logical  relations  and  connections  of  events.  Me 
is  a  Gospel  with  a  persuasive  plan  and  purpose,  and  not  a 
biography  or  life  of  Jesus. 

This  lack  of  moral  motivation  is  not  to  be  exploited  in 
favor  of  the  pathographic  contention.  Jesus’  conduct  can  be 
explained  by  abundant  historical  reasons.  His  itinerary  and 
peregrinations  manifest  nothing  of  the  fretful  restlessness  and 
senseless  vagabondage  of  those  cases  of  morbid  mentality  who 
are  forever  dissatisfied  and  discontented  with  their  present  sur¬ 
roundings. 

The  other  main  feature  in  the  general  character  of  Jesus’ 
conduct  that  has  figured  in  the  pathographic  contention  is  his 
habit  of  retreat  to  solitude.  Rasmussen  sees  in  these  retreats 
the  pendulum  swinging  to  that  extreme  of  morbid  fear  which 
contrasts  so  strikingly  with  his  unbalanced  boldness  on  other 
occasions.  Binet-Sangle  has  Jesus  retreat  to  solitude  where  in 

(1)  See  Professor  Bacon’s  identical  formulation  of  the  question  in  his 
article,  What  Did  Judas  Betray?  Hibbert  Journal,  April  1921,  XIX,  3, 
p.  476-493.  Professor  Bacon  finds  a  very  different  WHAT  (the  anointing 
in  Bethany)  than  does  Schweitzer  (the  Messianic  secret). 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


189 


undisturbed  seclusion  he  can  give  his  imagination  full  and  free 
play.  While  thus  apart  Jesus  surrenders  himself  to  his  vesanic 
passion  and  delusion.  In  the  intimacy  of  his  consciousness  he 
played  the  part  of  king  and  God  and  abandoned  himself  to  the 
contemplation  of  his  work  and  the  adoration  of  his  own  ego 

. Xo  doubt  many  of  these  nocturnal  seasons  of  prayer 

began  in  musings  and  ended  in  hallucinations  (III  114ff  ). 
More  generally  he  remarks,  For  such  aliens  retreat  and  prayer 
are  pure  pretexts;  in  reality  they  are  a  theater  for  a  subjective 
cinematograph  of  a  type  of  “ contemplation  ’  which  in  certain 
cases  becomes  hallucinatory  (III  71). 

In  the  examination  of  the  Synoptic  sources  we  find  that 
Jesus’  retreats  to  solitude,  with  the  exception  of  Gethsemane, 
are  confined  to  Galilee.  Mt  recounts  only  one  such  retreat, 
Me  three,  and  Lc  six.  They  are  as  follows: 


1) 

2) 

3) 

4) 

5) 

6) 
7) 


.  Me  1,35-38  (prayer) 

.  1,45 

.  . . .  •••••••••••••••••« 

Mt  14,23  (prayer)  6,46  (prayer) 


Lc  4,42-43 

5,16  (prayer) 
6,12ff  (prayer) 

9,18  (prayer) 
9,28-29  (prayer) 
11,1  (prayer) 


This  list  shows  that  the  motive  and  purpose  of  Jesus’  re¬ 
treats  is  not  always  given.  In  the  initial  retreat,  Me  1,35-38, 
Jesus’  problem  is  pressingly  personal  and  pointed;  Lc  in  his 
parallel  for  some  unknown  reason  eliminates  the  pressing  per¬ 
sonal  element  and  in  1,12-43  he  ha,s  Jesus  simply7  withdrawing 
from  Capernaum.  Me  1,45  has  Jesus  without  in  the  desert 
places  because  his  fame  as  a  healer  will  no  more  allow  him 
to  openly  enter  a  city;  Lc’s  parallel  in  5,16  gives  a  very  differ¬ 
ent  reason.  That  there  is  truth  in  Me  1,45  to  the  effect  that 
Jesus  withdrew  often  to  the  desert  places  in  order  to  escape 
the  people  and  retire  for  rest  and  refreshment  is  clear  from  Me 
6,31  where  Jesus  invites  the  disciples  to  withdraw  to  a  desert 
place  for  rest  after  their  mission. 

But,  on  the  whole,  the  Symoptists  regard  prayer  as  the  real 
purpose  of  Jesus’  retreats  to  solitude.  Mt’s  only  retreat  is  for 
prayer;  two  of  Mc’s  three  are  for  prayer;  and  five  of  Lc’s  six 
are  for  prayer  (Mc’s  parallel  to  Lc  4,42-43  is  for  prayer;  Me 


190 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


6,46  is  the  second  verse  of  Lc’s  great  omission  of  Marcan 
matter). 

Lc  manifests  the  greatest  interest  in  the  devotional  life  of 
Jesus.  Besides  the  five  retreats  for  prayer  listed  above,  he 
alone  represents  Jesus  as  praying  at  the  baptism  (3,21),  as 
continuing  all  night  in  prayer  to  God  before  choosing  the 
twelve  (6,12-13)  as  praying  at  Caesarea  Philippi  (9,18)  and 
at  the  transfiguration  (9,28-29),  and  as  having  made  special 
supplication  for  Simon  in  view  of  his  denial  (22,31-32).  Lc 
alone  reports  the  two  priceless  parables  to  the  end  that  the 
disciples  ought  always  to  pray  and  pray  persistently  (18,1- 
14).  For  Lc  the  decisions  and  choices  of  Jesus  at  great  mo¬ 
ments  and  junctures  in  his  public  career  are  the  result  of  prayer 
and  petition. 

These  retreats  for  prayer  seem,  for  the  most  part,  to  have 
been  at  night.  Me  1,35  Jesus  rose  up  a  great  while  before 
day;  Lc  6,12  he  spent  all  night  in  prayer;  Lc  9,28(37)  he  is 
all  night  on  the  mountain  with  the  three  disciples,  and  Geth- 
semane  is  a  nocturnal  retreat.  That  there  is  nothing  patho¬ 
logical  in  this  habit  of  Jesus  is  clear  from  the  fact  that  it 
accords  with  his  instruction  on  the  proper  place  for  prayer 
as  apart  and  secret  (Mt  6,6). 

Further,  it  is  just  in  the  satisfaction  that  these  retreats 
afford  Jesus  that  designates  them  as  healthy.  These  retreats 
constitute  what  Dr.  Moerchen  would  doubtless  call  a  variety 
of  genuine  asceticism  in  which,  over  against  pseudo-asceticism, 
he  refuses  to  see  anything  pathological.  He  writes:  It  is  pre¬ 
cisely  in  the  actual  satisfaction  which  it  affords  that  we  recog¬ 
nize  the  genuineness  of  a  real  asceticism  over  against  a  type 
of  self-mortification  that  resembles  it  only  in  a  most  superficial 
way ,  such  as  we  find  in  typical  hysteria ,  particularly  in  the 
hysteric  temperament  (PH,  S.  23f). 

Nothing  pathological  is  to  be  found  in  Jesus’  retreats  to 
solitude  except  from  the  viewpoint  of  consequent  medical  mat¬ 
erialism,  which  sees  in  all  religious  devotion  and  piety  only  a 
sign  of  mental  malady  or  degeneration.  Here  Binet-Sangle’s 
words  are  characteristic  and  typical :  Piety  is  a  mark  of  de¬ 
generacy  to  be  observed  only  in  emotional,  sentimental  and  hyp- 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


191 


ersuggestible  characters  incapable  of  observing,  comparing , 
reasoning  and  thinking  for  themselves  (I  185). 

In  conclusion  on  Jesus’  conduct  as  a  whole  we  do  best  to 
quote  the  important  psychiatric  principle  laid  down  by  Dr. 
Moerchen :  In  the  judgment  of  thought  and  conduct  what 
a  person  says  or  does  is  not  so  important  as  w  h  y  he  says 
and  does  it  (PH,  S.  32f).  The  sources  furnish  us  no  morbid 
w  h  y  that  would  explain  the  conduct  of  Jesus. 

2)  Plis  Character 

We  cannot  here  attempt  a  delineation  of  the  character 
of  Jesus,  nor  even  touch  upon  all  of  those  traits  in  his  char¬ 
acter  which  have  figured  in  the  pathographic  contention.  Be¬ 
sides,  character  in  general  is  a  fruitless  field  for  pathological 
psychanalysis.  Some  types  of  mental  degeneracy  and  aliena¬ 
tion  often  manifest  and  possess  certain  very  amiable  and  even 
enviable  traits  of  character.  On  the  other  hand,  a  perfectly 
healthy-minded  person  often  manifests  and  possesses  idiosyn¬ 
crasies  and  eccentricities  of  character  that  are  less  common  to 
the  average  run  of  men  and  are  frequently  paralleled  in  clin¬ 
ical  cases.  This  state  of  the  facts  makes  it  forever  impossible 
for  certain  single  traits  of  character  to  serve  as  sure  symptoms 
for  a  diagnosis  of  psychic  health  or  malady.  The  diagnosis 
must  go  beyond  and  behind  the  character  to  its  causes  in  order 
to  be  true.  We  here  single  out  only  two  traits  in  Jesus’  char¬ 
acter  that  have  been  most  consistently  cited  in  the  psychiatric 
discussion:  Jesus’  relations  with  his  own  family,  and  his  atti¬ 
tude  toward  his  enemies. 

The  question  of  Jesus’  personal  relations  with  his  imme¬ 
diate  family  is  to  be  kept  distinctly  separate  from  the  more 
general  question  of  his  teaching  regarding  the  family  and 
marriage  as  social  institutions.  In  this  more  general  question 
such  passages  as  Me  10,2-12  (==Mt  19,3-9)  and  Mt  5,32 
(=Lc  16,18)  come  into  consideration.  The  relation  of  the 
family  to  the  demands  of  discipleship  is  expressed  in  Mt  10,37 
(Lc’s  parallel  in  14,25f  is  still  more  exacting)  and  Mt  19,10- 
12.  Me  12,25  (=Mt  22,30=Lc  20,35f)  excludes  marriage 
relationships  from  the  kingdom  of  God  and  furnishes  A. 


192 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Schweitzer  with  the  chief  of  his  foundation  pillars  for  the  erec¬ 
tion  of  a  distinction  between  a  permanent  and  probationary 
ethics  in  Jesus’  teaching  and  preaching. 

In  the  more  special  question  of  Jesus’  relations  with  his 
immediate  family  two  brief  biographical  incidents  demand  at¬ 
tention.  The  first  is  the  scene  described  in  Me  3,31-35  (=Mt 
12,46-50=Lc  8,19-21)  in  which  Jesus’  mother  and  brethren 
come  from  Nazareth  and  find  Jesus  in  a  Capernaum  house  to 
which  they  cannot  gain  entrance  because  of  the  crowd;  they 
therefore  have  their  request  to  see  him  communicated  through 
the  crowd  that  surrounds  him.  When  the  request  reaches  Jesus 
he  does  not  reply  to  the  real  request  at  all,  but  asks,  Who  is 
my  mother  and  my  brethren?  (Lc  omits  this  rhetorical  ques¬ 
tion.)  And  looking  round  on  them  that  sat  round  about  him 
(in  Mt,  his  disciples)  he  saith,  Behold  my  mother  and  my 
brethren !  For  whosoever  shall  do  the  will  of  God,  the  same  is 
my  brother,  and  sister,  and  mother.  Lc’s  parallel  is  consider¬ 
ably  abbreviated:  8,21b,  My  mother  and  my  brethren  are 
these  that  hear  the  word  of  God,  and  do  it.  Lc’s  form  of  Jesus’ 
word  here  is  practically  identical  with  Jesus’  reply  to  the  woman 
in  Lc  11,27-28  which  is  peculiar  to  Lc,  and  reads:  And  it 
came  to  pass  as  he  said  these  things,  a  certain  woman  out  of 
the  multitude  lifted  up  her  voice,  and  said  unto  him.  Blessed 
is  the  womb  that  bare  thee,  and  the  breasts  which  thou  didst 
suck.  But  he  said.  Yea  rather,  blessed  are  they  that  hear  the 
word  of  God,  and  keep  it. 

Not  only  Jesus’  pathographers  but  his  biographers  have 
constituted  a  serious  and  real  break  and  estrangement  between 
Jesus  and  his  family.  Renan  wrote,  II  precha  hardiment  la 
guerre  a  la  nature,  la  totale  rupture  avec  le  sang.  O.  Holtz- 
mann  writes  of  a  definite  break  between  Jesus  and  his  family  and 
supplies  reasons  for  it  (LJ,  S.  193).  Liberal  criticism  in  re¬ 
cent  years  has  found  the  Mary  of  Me,  as  well  as  Jesus’  breth¬ 
ren,  to  have  been  unsympathetic  with  Jesus’  appearance  in 
public,  if  not  an  avowed  unbeliever.  The  Synoptics  know  noth¬ 
ing  of  the  presence  of  Jesus’  mother  at  the  cross  and  his  com¬ 
mission  in  her  behalf  to  the  beloved  disciple;  only  the  Fourth 
Gospel  reports  this,  19,25-27.  During  his  lifetime  we  find 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


193 


nothing  that  would  lead  us  to  think  that  any  of  Jesus’  immedi¬ 
ate  family  were  identified  with  his  following. 

Rasmussen  says  that  Jesus  by  word  and  example  laid  every 
possible  hindrance  in  the  way  of  marriage ;  he  raised  new  bar¬ 
riers  for  the  divorced  by  forbidding  remarriage  (S.  154).  De 
Loosten  finds  Jesus’  lack  of  appreciation  for  the  institution 
of  the  family  in  general  and  his  attitude  toward  his  own  family 
in  particular  a  sign  of  psychic  degeneration  par  excellence  (S. 
59).  He  had  lost  all  natural  human  feelings . Through¬ 

out  his  life  he  lived  at  enmity  with  his  family,  or  at  least  with¬ 
out  concern  for  it  (S.  51).  In  Me  3,31ff  he  greets  his  own 
mother  with  disrespect.  Binet-Sangle  finds  that  Jesus  never 
returned  the  affection  and  love  of  his  devoted  mother,  but  releg¬ 
ated  her  to  the  shadows  of  inattention  and  indifference  (I 
lllff).  However,  he  classes  Mary  as  a  believer,  but  divides  the 
brothers  and  sisters  of  Jesus  into  the  clan  messianique  and  the 
clan  antimessianique  (I  122,  130). 

We  turn  then  to  the  two  incidents,  Me  3,31-35  and  Lc  11, 
27-28.  In  regard  to  both  we  can  say,  as  Strauss  did  of  the 
first,  that  they  throw  no  light  upon  the  actual  state  of  relations 
between  Jesus  and  his  immediate  family.  Strauss  wrote  in 
his  1835  Leben  Jesu,  I  763:  No  information  concerning  the 
relation  between  Jesus  and  his  family  at  this  time  is  to  be 
gleaned  from  this  notice,  for  it  belongs  rather  to  those  exag¬ 
gerations  which  Mark  enjoys  supplying,  not  only  in  his  gen¬ 
eral  delineations  but  in  the  introductions  of  particular  incid¬ 
ents.  This  statement  of  Strauss  is  true  for  two  reasons.  Mc’s 
representation  of  Jesus’  seeming  indifference  toward  his  own 
f amity’s  request  upon  this  occasion  belongs  to  his  character¬ 
istic  exaggeration  of  the  lack  of  understanding  for  Jesus’  mis¬ 
sion  and  words,  not  only  on  the  part  of  his  disciples,  but  also 
on  the  part  of  his  own  family.  Still  more  important  is  the 
fact  that  the  Synoptists  are  interested  in  this  scene,  not  in 
and  of  itself,  but  only  as  it  furnishes  a  setting  for  Jesus’  word 
regarding  his  true  kinsmen  among  whom  the  Synoptists  count 
themselves  and  their  confessing  readers.  The  whole  incident 
has  its  climax  in  this  word  of  Jesus.  The  Gospel  writers  never 
seem  to  realize  what  an  unfavorable  light  they  throw  upon  their 


m 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


hero  and  his  relations  to  those  whom  he  should  naturally  love 
best.  They  (Mt  and  Lc)  report  only  Jesus'  sharp  reply  with¬ 
out  thinking  what  an  unfavorable  light  falls  upon  him  when 
such  an  answer  was  not  occasioned  by  very  unbecoming  conduct 
on  the  part  of  his  mother  and  brethren  (P.  W.  Schmiedel,  dYE, 
S.  19). 

This  scene  belongs  to  those  many  uncompleted  scenes  in 
all  four  of  the  Gospels,  for  all  four  often  leave  scenes  incom¬ 
plete.  Incidents  are  frequently  developed  to  the  point  where 
the}7  furnish  an  occasion  for  some  word  of  Jesus  and  they  are 
let  drop  because  the  evangelists  have  no  further  interest  in 
them.  This  scene  in  Me  3,31  ff  is  one  of  them.  Lc  leaves  the 
scene  in  18,15-17  uncompleted;  both  Mt  (19,15)  and  Me  (10, 
16)  complete  it.  Lc  never  tells  us  what  becomes  of  the  other 
nine  lepers  after  he  has  the  one  Samaritan  return  to  express 
his  gratitude ;  we  might  think  that  only  this  one  was  cured 
(17,12-19).  These  unfinished  incidents  are  specially  frequent 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel;  the  scene  in  l,19f  is  not  brought  to  an 
end,  neither  the  Nicodemus  scene  in  3,lff,  nor  the  incident  of 
the  request  of  the  Greeks  in  chapter  12. 

In  Me  3,31  ff  we  are  not  told  whether  Jesus  responds  to  the 
request  of  his  mother  and  brethren.  We  only  know  this,  that 
if  they  came  to  Capernaum  to  bring  him  back  to  Nazareth  they 
were  unsuccessful  (See  O.  Holtzmann,  LJ,  S.  191).  Not  one 
of  the  Synoptists  feels  obliged  nor  takes  the  trouble  to  com¬ 
plete  the  scene.  We  should  have  been  very  grateful  to  any  one 
of  them  if  he  had  done  this,  for  we,  with  our  modern  code  of 
ethics,  should  like  to  have  more  light  on  the  relations  of  Jesus 
with  his  family.  But  the  early  Christian,  whether  writer  or 
reader,  had  no  such  interest  in  this  incident.  He  was  inter¬ 
ested  above  all  in  the  fact  that  Jesus  had  proclaimed  all  who 
do  God?s  will  as  his  mother,  his  sister,  and  his  brother. 

Still  more  general  considerations  may  be  urged.  For  Jesus 
to  have  remained  at  home  and  in  Nazareth  would  have  made 
the  fulfillment  of  his  mission  impossible.  The  very  exigencies 
of  his  task  forced  him  away  from  home  and  native  city.  As 
Renan  said,  this  demand  for  a  break  with  home  and  early  sur¬ 
roundings  was  not  easy  for  Jesus.  He  returned  to  Nazareth 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


195 


at  the  very  pinnacle  of  his  Galilean  success  and  popularity 
(Me  6,l-6=Mt  13,54-58)  only  to  encounter  an  unbelief  that 
made  a  continued  effort  there  impossible.  Jesus  did  not  reject 
Nazareth;  Nazareth  rejected  him.  He  did  not  even  include 
his  native  city  among'  those  upon  which  his  woes  fell  (Mt  11, 
20ff=Lc  10,12ff),  yet  it  was  there  that  he  received  his  great¬ 
est  rebuff.  As  A.  Harnack  writes,  He  who  had  not  where  to 
lay  his  head  does  not  speak  as  one  who  had  broken  with  every¬ 
thing  (WC,  S.  24). 

The  great  men  of  history  with  great  missions  have  often 
followed  exactly  in  the  footsteps  of  Jesus  in  this  regard.  Home 
and  family  they  have  sacrificed  in  the  interests  of  their  larger 
commissions  and  tasks  which  they  could  accomplish  only  by 
recognizing  and  admitting  no  obstacles.  Dr.  Moerchen  writes 
to  the  point:  A  thought ,  a  passion ,  an  aspiration  can  sway 
them  so  completely  that  all  the  minor  and  major  concerns  of 
daily  life ,  even  family  and  friends,  in  fact  everything  else  ap¬ 
pears  to  them  so  insignificant  and  unimportant  that  they  cast 
them  aside  and  bear  the  eventual  reactions  of  wounded  affec¬ 
tions  with  ease,  even  with  an  apparently  paradoxical  pleasure. 
It  is  out  of  this  metal  that  the  heroes  ,  those  of  the  state 
as  well  as  those  of  religion.  .  .  ...  .,  are  moulded.  It  is  the  rec¬ 
ognizing  of  no  obstacles  that  constitutes  the  hero  (PH,  S.  12). 
How  many  men,  great  and  less  great,  have  not  found  a  great 
cause  or  felt  a  great  commission  to  be  greater  than  the  duties 
of  home  and  the  ties  of  family! 

The  above  remarks  on  Me  3,31ff  are  pertinent  to  the  scene 
in  Lc  11,37.  Schaefer  gives  a  good  comment  on  this  incident: 
The  really  great  men  “ who  identify  themselves  completely  with 
their  cause ”  not  only  find  no  gratification  in  such  fickle  flattery 
but  such  is  distasteful  to  them  (S.  73). 

We  now  come  to  the  second  trait  in  Jesus’  character  which 
has  figured  conspicuously  in  the  pathographic  position,  name¬ 
ly,  his  attitude  toward  his  enemies.  Here  neither  the  Galilean 
nor  the  Jerusalem  contentions  can  come  into  consideration. 
The  Galilean  contentions  (Me  2,l-3,6=Mt  9,1-17 ;  12,1-14= 
Lc  5,17-6,11)  (Me  7,1  -23=Mt  15,1-20)  have  as  their  main 


196 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


issue  the  unconventional  conduct  of  Jesus  which  accords  per¬ 
fectly  with  his  preaching  of  the  purer  precepts  of  piety  in 
Mt  6,1-18.  The  Jerusalem  contentions  (Me  ll,27-33=Mt 
21,23-27=Lc  20,1-8)  (Me  12,13-17=Mt  22,15-22=Lc  20, 
20-26)  (Me  12,18-27=Mt  22,23-33=Lc  20,27-38)  (Me  12, 
35-37=Mt  22,41-46:=Lc  20,11-14)  only  show  how  formidable 
a  foe  the  Jerusalem  authorities  found  in  Jesus  and  how  dem¬ 
olishing  were  the  effects  of  his  dialectic  against  them.  The 
particular  address  that  figures  here  is  Jesus’  scathing  denun¬ 
ciation  of  the  religion  of  the  Pharisees  and  scribes  in  Mt  23,1- 
36=Mc  12,38-40=Lc  11,39-52;  20,45-47.  Rasmussen  writes, 
Against  his  enemies  he  employed  the  coarse  expressions  of  lan¬ 
guage  (S.  138).  De  Loosten  finds  Jesus  incapable  of  brooking 
opposition,  and  against  his  contemporaries,  as  well  as  against 
his  enemies,  he  hurls  insult  and  slander  in  a  truly  degenerate 
fashion.  Hirseh  writes :  No  one  could  have  been  more  intoler¬ 
ant  towards  his  opponents  than  he.  Not  only  his  “enemies” 
but  everyone  who  does  not  believe  in  all  his  eccentricities  should 
be  punished  by  “ eternal  damnation  ”  and ,  with  a  millstone  about 
his  neck,  be  thrown  into  the  sea  (p.  133;  Ger.  S.  133). 

That  the  Pharisees  were  not  the  renegade  lot  that  we  com¬ 
monly  suppose  has  been  adequately  shown  by  the  research  in 
the  field  of  New  Testament  contemporary  history  on  Jewish  soil 
by  men  like  E.  Schuerer  (1).  But  Jesus’  address  against  them 
with  its  characterization  of  the  false  pity  of  the  greater  num¬ 
ber  of  them  stands  as  a  true  historical  picture  of  their  religion 
in  his  day.  That  Jesus  had  not  broken  with  the  Pharisees 
en  masse  is  evident  enough  in  the  Gospel  of  Lc  where  Jesus, 
as  in  none  other  of  the  Gospels,  is  portrayed  as  a  friend  of 
the  publicans,  sinners,  and  social  outcasts,  yet  in  which  Jesus 
often  appears  at  the  table  of  some  Pharisee.  Lc  is  especiallv 
fond  of  having  Jesus  at  meat  with  some  Pharisee:  7,36ff ; 
ll,37ff ;  and  the  series  of  dinner  addresses  in  14,1-24. 


(1)  ( Geschichte  des  juedisclien  Volkes  im  Zeitalter  Jesu  Christi;  Leipzig, 

2.  Auflage  1890,  I.  Teil  751  S.,  II.  Teil  1886,  884  S.),  W.  Bousset  ( Die  Re¬ 
ligion  des  Judentums  im  neutestamentlichen  Zeitalter;  2.  Auflage  Berlin 
1906,  617  S.),  and  M.  Friedlaender  ( Die  religioesen  Bewegungen  innerhalb 
des  Judentums  im  Zeitalter  Jesu;  Berlin  1905,  380  S.) 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


197 


To  return  to  the  address  of  denunciation  against  the 
Pharisees,  we  can  say  that  it  is  not  the  outburst  of  a  frenzied 
fanatic  but  a  true  picture  projected  in  a  genuine  prophetic 
tone.  No  less  a  distinguished  scholar  than  Gottlieb  Klein, 
Rabbi  in  Stockholm,  lays  this  address  as  one  of  the  foundation 
stones  upon  which  Jesus  stands  as  a  real  man  of  history.  He 
finds  Jesus5  address  in  Mt  23,16ff  so  true  to  life  and  exact 
that  he  proclaims  it  an  historical  document  of  the  very  first 
order  which  is  comprehensible  only  in  the  light  of  history  con¬ 
temporary  with  Jesus.  With  each  word  Jesus  hits  the  nail  on 
the  head  (S.  18) . 

Further,  Jesus’  enemies  were  not  imaginary  as  are  those 
of  the  alienated  mind  of  the  psychiatric  clinic  who  sees  a  foe 
in  his  best  friends  and  caretakers.  Jesus’  enemies  were  real; 
they  had  him  nailed  to  the  cross. 

The  Gospel  writers  never  give  us  a  delineation  of  the  char¬ 
acter  of  Jesus.  We  gain  our  impressions  of  his  character  only 
by  the  reactions  of  his  contemporaries,  both  friends  and  foes. 
His  first  disciples  follow  him  without  a  word  (Me  1,16-20), 
prima  vista  (Wellhausen,  Einl.,  S.  38f).  Why  he  calls  them 
and  why  they  follow  him,  we  do  not  know.  Never  once  do  we 
read  that  he  advises  or  consults  with  them.  Just  once,  but 
never  again,  do  they  attempt  to  restrain  him  (Me  8,32f). 
They  fear  him  (Me  4,41 ;  6,51 ;  9,6)  ;  when  they  do  not  under¬ 
stand  him  they  dare  ask  him  no  questions  (Me  9,32;  10,32). 
Houses  (Me  1,29  33;  2,1;  3,19  31;  7,17  24;  9,28  33; 
10,10 ;  14,3),  boats  (Me  3,9 ;  4,1  36 ;  5,2  18  21 ;  6,32  51 ;  8,10 
13;  Lc  5,3),  synagogues  (Me  1,21;  3,1;  6,2;  Lc  4,15f),  the 
temple  (Me  14,49;  Lc  19,47),  special  rooms  (Me  14,14ff), 
tables  (Me  2,15;  14,3;  14,18  ;  Lc  7,36;  ll,37ff ;  14,  Iff ;  19,5), 
and  substance  (Lc  8,3)  are  at  his  constant  disposition.  In 
all  this  not  one  word  of  thanks  do  we  hear  crossing  his  lips. 
His  cures  and  words  cause  amazement  and  remarks;  his  fame 
spreads  like  wild-fire ;  he  is  thronged  by  the  multitudes  who 
hear  him  gladly  (Me  12,37 ;  Lc  13,17)  and  bring  their  sick 
to  be  cured.  He  is  touched  by  the  faith  of  an  afflicted  woman 
(Me  5,2 5ff)  and  he  yields  to  a  word  well  put  (Me  7,29). 


198 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


The  multitudes  hang  listening  on  his  words  for  three  days 
without  having  food  (Me  8,2).  They  anticipate  him  in  reach¬ 
ing  his  landing  points  about  the  sea  of  Galilee  where  they 
await  and  welcome  him  (Lc  8,40).  On  some  occasions  the  mul¬ 
titudes  seek  to  stay  him  that  he  should  not  depart  from  them 
(Lc  4,42)  ;  other  crowds  fear  and  are  anxious  to  be  rid  of  him 
(Me  5,17).  He  casts  out  demons  with  a  word  and  cures  as 
easily  (Mt  8,16)  ;  afflicted  bodies  and  members  are  restored  to 
health  and  their  normal  functioning  under  the  touch  of  his 
hand  and  at  his  rebuke  a  fever  departs.  Crowds  throng  him 
so  that  they  cannot  so  much  as  eat  bread  (Me  3,20),  they  tread 
upon  one  another  (Lc  12,1),  and  the  disciples  fear  that  they 
will  crush  him  (Lc  8,45).  Because  of  his  popularity  he  can 
no  more  openly  enter  into  a  city  but  must  remain  without  in 
desert  places  (Me  1,45),  but  the  people  stream  unto  him  from 
every  quarter.  To  escape  the  multitudes  he  withdraws  from 
cities,  crosses  and  recrosses  the  sea  of  Galilee,  journeys  to  the 
north  (Me  7,24),  travels  incognito,  but  he  cannot  be  hid. 
Great  throngs  accompany  him  to  the  passover  and  shout  Hos¬ 
annas  as  he  enters  the  capital.  He  is  arrested  and  condemned. 
For  some  unknown  reason  the  people  do  not  or  cannot  defend 
and  save  him.  They  follow  him  to  the  cross  and  go  away  smit¬ 
ing  their  breasts  (Lc  23,48).  A  centurion  confesses,  Truly 
this  man  was  the  Son  of  God  (Me  15,39). 

The  only  characterization  of  Jesus  found  in  the  Gospels 
is  on  the  lips  of  his  enemies,  who  say  to  him,  Teacher ,  we  know 
that  thou  art  true,  and  carest  not  for  any  one;  for  thou  regard- 
est  not  the  person  of  men,  hut  of  a  truth  teachest  the  way  of 
God  (Me  12,14).  How  much  of  this  is  flattery  we  do  not 
know.  But  Jesus’  words  and  conduct  early  give  rise  to  oppo¬ 
sition.  In  his  contentions  with  his  enemies  they  are  unsuccess¬ 
ful  in  their  attempts  to  provoke  him  to  ill-advised  statements 
that  would  trap  him.  He  silences  them,  puts  questions  that  they 
cannot  or  dare  not  answer  (Lc  14,6),  he  puts  them  to  shame 
(Lc  13,17)  and  forces  them  to  concede  his  points  (Lc  20,39), 
and  no  one  dares  ask  him  any  question  (Me  12,34).  Herod 
is  perplexed  (Lc  9,7),  would  kill  him  (13,31),  and  sought  long 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


199 


to  see  him  (23,8).  Pilate  is  amazed  at  the  eloquence  of  his 
silence  (Me  15,5). 

The  above  outline  is  by  no  means  an  exhaustive  list  of  the 
reactions  that  might  serve  in  a  more  complete  characteriza¬ 
tion  of  Jesus’  personality,  but  it  strikes  upon  the  main  points. 
We  learn  chiefly  that  he  spoke  as  one  having  authority,  that 
his  congenial  character  readily  won  for  him  friends  from  all 
classes  of  his  contemporaries,  and  that  his  unconventional  con¬ 
duct  and  teaching  made  for  him  many  enemies  among  the  reli¬ 
gious  leaders.  As  a  character  Jesus  appears  to  us  in  the 
Synoptics  as  congenial,  yet  commanding,  as  unconventional, 
yet  uncompromising  in  the  affairs  pertaining  to  the  kingdom 
of  God.  None  of  these  traits  in  Jesus’  character  necessitate 
or  even  suggest  a  psychopathic  diagnosis. 

3)  His  Consciousness 

The  question  of  Jesus’  consciousness,  or  better  perhaps 
self-consciousness,  has  a  very  different  bearing  on  the  problem 
of  his  psychic  health  than  does  the  question  of  his  character. 
In  fact,  it  is  of  paramount  importance  in  the  pathographic 
issue.  In  certain  serious  forms  of  mental  alienation,  particu¬ 
larly  in  paranoia,  it  is  the  subject’s  estimate  of  his  own  ego 
that  constitutes  the  surest  symptom  of  his  psychic  derange¬ 
ment.  It  is  here  that  that  deplorable  divergence  from  reality, 
actuality,  concrete  condition  and  circumstance  begins  which  is 
convincing  in  determining  the  subject’s  state  as  morbid.  The 
inmate  of  the  institution  for  the  insane  imagines  himself  a 
president,  a  king,  a  general,  a  millionaire,  a  Messiah,  or  even 
a  God,  with  all  the  pertaining  pretentions,  prerogatives,  and 
plans. 

It  is  Jesus’  exalted  self-consciousness,  his  assumption  of 
a  unique  filial  relationship  with  the  Father,  his  acceptance  of 
the  Messianic  role,  and  his  identification  of  himself  with  the 
Son  of  man  who  was  to  appear  on  the  clouds  of  heaven  attended 
by  angelic  hosts,  institute  and  conduct  the  great  last  assize 
and  establish  the  new  world  order,  that  has  been  chiefly  respon¬ 
sible  for  bringing  on  the  charges  against  his  psychic  health. 


200 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


It  led  Strauss  to  conclude  that  Jesus  was  a  fanatic,  and  von 
Hartmann  that  he  was  a  transcendental  fanatic.  In  the  1905- 
form  of  the  question  it  has  directed  and  determined  the  diag¬ 
noses  that  have  been  made,  particularly  those  of  de  Loosten, 
Binet-Sangle  and  Hirsch  who  see  in  Jesus  a  tj-pical  clinical 
case  of  paranoia.  They  speak  respectively  of  Jesus’  exces¬ 
sively  exalted  self-consciousness  that  gradually  developed  into 
a  veritable  Walinsystem,  his  delirium,  idee  fixe,  vesanic  pride, 
theomegalomania,  and  his  delusions  of  grandeur.  Rasmussen 
finds  that  Jesus  possessed  the  characteristic  prophetic  Groes- 
senwahn.  Holtzmann  contends  that  Jesus’  self-consciousness 
began  in,  was  based  upon,  and  was  bolstered  up  by  experiences 
of  ecstasy,  for  it  goes  out  far  be3Tond  the  common  confines  and 
compass  of  ordinary  human  consciousness.  Even  Schweitzer 
concedes  that  Jesus’  exalted  estimate  of  himself  ( Selb stein - 
sciiaetzung)  admits  of  psychiatric  discussion  (PBJ,  S.  44)  ; 
also  Dr.  Moerchen  (see  above  p.  125). 

Beginning  with  the  eighties  of  the  last  century  Jesus’  self- 
consciousness  has  become  one  of  the  most  prominent  and  puz¬ 
zling  problems  in  the  historical  criticism  of  the  New  Testa¬ 
ment.  Increased  investigation  and  research  have  led  to  new 
problems  rather  than  to  solutions.  A  whole  series  of  subor¬ 
dinate  questions  have  arisen.  When  and  where  did  the  full 
realization  of  his  Messianic  consciousness  dawn  upon  Jesus,  at 
the  baptism,  temptation,  Caesarea  Philippi,  or  the  transfig¬ 
uration?  What  was  Jesus’  attitude  toward  his  Messianic  mis¬ 
sion?  Did  he  feel  it  as  a  boon  or  a  burden?  What  were  the 
reasons  for  the  careful  reserve  that  he  so  long-  practiced? 
Were  they  political,  pedagogical,  or  personal?  In  what  sense 
did  he  understand  and  emplo}7  the  expression  Son  of  man,  as 
Messiah,  man,  or  simply  a  circumlocution  in  the  third  person 
for  the  first  person  pronoun  “I”?  Or  did  Jesus  ever  employ 
this  expression,  was  it  not  linguistically  impossible  in  the 
Aramaic?  Was  his  understanding  of  the  term  Son  of  God 
theocratic  or  religio-ethical?  (Compare  H.  J.  Holtzmann, 
MBJ,  S.  43).  Into  all  of  these  rambling  ramifications  the 
writer  cannot  go,  even  if  he  were  qualified.  The  two  best 
single  treatments  of  these  questions  are  W.  Baldensperger’s 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


201 


Das  Selbstbewusstsein  Jesu  and  H.  J.  Holtzmann’s  Das  mes- 
sianische  Bewusstsein  Jesu. 

Our  present  interest  confines  our  study  to  only  those  phases 
of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  which  have  been  presented  as  patho¬ 
logical  in  their  bearing  by  Jesus’  pathographers.  These  phases 
of  the  problem  can  best  be  formulated  as  follows:  Was  Jesus’ 
self-consciousness  morbid  in  its — 1)  rise;  2)  reinforcement; 
3)  form;  1)  content,  control  and  confession?  We  proceed  to 
deal  with  these  nhases  in  their  designated  order. 

A)  Its  Rise 

The  birthplace  or  -hour  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  is  not 
at  all  clearly  indicated  in  the  Synoptic  sources.  In  the  course 
of  the  life-of- Jesus  research  its  location  and  date  have  been  left 
to  the  biographer’s  imagination,  but  all  of  Jesus’  biographers 
have  not  imagined  alike.  This  state  of  the  sources  has  led  not 
a  few  to  regard  any  solution  of  the  rise  of  Jesus’  self-con¬ 
sciousness  with  suspicion.  They  regard  it  as  Jesus’  own  secret 
how  he  came  to  this  unusual  consciousness  and  no  psychology 
will  ever  succeed  in  unveiling  it  (thus  A.  Harnack,  WC,  S. 
81).  Others  find  a  solution  impossible  because  Jesus  appears 
on  the  scene  mature  and  finished  in  every  respect.  Here  Weidel 
is  representative:  Jesus  appears  on  the  scene  a  completed 
character  like  Fallas  fully  armed  out  of  the  head  of  Zeus  (S. 
21).  Harnack  is  of  the  same  opinion:  It  is  very  probable  that 
at  the  time  of  his  public  appearance  he  was  personally  already 
fully  developed  and  mature  (WC,  S.  88).  Still  others  find  no 
change  in  Jesus’  inner  attitudes  and  orientations  during  his 
public  career ;  they  find  only  what  Weizsaecker  calls  an  altered 
attitude  toward  the  outside  world  (S.  283).  Here  again  Weidel 
writes :  There  is  nowhere  the  slightest  trace  of  any  kind  of 
development  in  his  person  during  h  is  public  career. 
His  views  and  ideas  may  change  according  to  the  particular 
occasions  that  call  them  forth,  but  at  heart  he  remains  the  same 
(S.  20).  Several,  with  H.  Wendt,  make  a  distinction  between 
Jesus’  filial  consciousness  and  his  Messianic  consciousness,  the 
first  forming  the  sure  groundwork  for  his  knowledge  of  the 
second  (II  123ff).  (Against  this  view  of  an  earlier  and  later 


202 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


stage  in  Jesus’  self-eonseiousness  see  W.  Baldensperger,  S. 
160).  Reorientations  and  readjustments  on  the  part  of  Jesus 
in  the  matter  of  his  consciousness  are  most  frequent  and  pro¬ 
nounced  in  A.  Schweitzer’s  consequent  eschatology. 

The  majority  of  Jesus’  biographers  and  critics  have  set 
his  baptism  at  the  Jordan  as  the  birthplace  and  -hour  of  his 
Messianic  consciousness.  W.  Beyschlag  writes,  It  was  at  this 
moment  that  Jesus  experienced  the  full  dawn  of  his  Messianic 
consciousness  and  commission  (II  112).  Of  the  voice  at  the 
Jordan  W.  Baldensperger  writes,  It  was  the  decisive  and 
unequivocal  declaration  of  Jesus'  Messiahship  (S.  160).  His 
view  of  the  baptism  is  supernaturalistic :  The  soil  was  ready  and 
the  divine  omnipotence  brought  it  about  that  Jesus  went  forth 

from  his  baptism  unshakably  certain  of  his  Messiahship . 

He  did  not  attain  this  consciousness  for  himself  by  any  process 
of  reasoning.  One  may  regard  the  incident  as  one  will,  but  it 
seems  to  be  a  thing  of  the  purest  impossibility  that  he  by  ever 
so  profound  a  process  of  thought  could  have  come  to  claim  for 
himself  the  Messianic  title . It  was  rather  a  direct  revela¬ 

tion  made  to  him  in  the  wonderful  depths  of  his  religious  and 
spiritual  life  and  by  which,  like  an  electric  shock,  his  person  was 
overwhelmingly  and  directly  struck  (S.  163f).  J.  Weiss,  from 
the  more  careful  historical  point  of  view,  writes,  The  experience 
at  the  baptism  marks  the  birthplace  of  this  (Messianic)  con¬ 
sciousness  (JPvRG,  S.  51). 

If  we  turn  to  the  S}rnoptic  sources  we  find  that  the  only 
thing  that  throws  a  Messianic  light  upon  the  baptism  at  the 
Jordan  is  the  Messianic  test  that  follows  it  immediately  in  Mt 
and  Lc.  Considering  Me  alone  there  is  no  necessity  for  dating 
Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness  with  the  baptism.  For  Me  the 
baptism  is  the  moment  of  Jesus’  special  selection  and  election 
as  the  Son  of  God,  the  moment  of  his  endowment  and  equip¬ 
ment  with  the  Divine  Spirit.  It  is  the  call  to  the  career  of  the 
prophet  similar  to  that  of  Amos  (7,11-15)  and  Isaiah  (6, Iff). 

For  Mt  and  Lc,  however,  the  experience  at  the  Jordan  con¬ 
stitutes  the  Messianic  call.  From  this  moment  on  Jesus  is  the 
Messiah  and  feels  himself  as  such.  That  this  is  the  view  of 
Mt  and  Lc  relative  to  the  revelation  at  the  baptism  is  clear  from 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


203 


the  character  of  the  temptation  which  immediately  follows  and 
which  for  both  the  first  and  third  evangelists  is  a  Messianic 
test.  But  that  this  test  in  the  desert  was  really  a  Messianic 
test  is  quite  another  question.  It  becomes  Messianic  in  Mt  and 
Lc  only  due  to  the  fact  that  they  insert  the  three  temptations 
from  Q  into  Mc’s  order  in  connection  with  1,12-13.  Me  makes 
only  a  general  mention  of  a  temptation ;  of  its  character  he 
tells  us  nothing.  His  mere  reference  to  it  would  suggest  that 
Me  attached  no  special  significance  or  importance  to  this  period 
of  solitude  in  the  desert.  It  is  certainly  not  Messianic  for 
Me,  for,  as  we  have  already  pointed  out  above  (page  157), 
the  three  Messianic  temptations  of  Mt  and  Lc  have  their  his¬ 
torical  points  of  contact  only  in  the  later  life  of  Jesus  accord¬ 
ing  to  Me.  If  Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness  were  given  at 
the  baptism,  it  would  render  the  whole  of  Mc’s  Galilean  ac¬ 
count  of  Jesus  unintelligible  and  contradictory.  It  would 
force  a  complete  revision  of  the  first  day  in  Capernaum  where 
Jesus’  seems  overtaken  by  surprise  at  the  discovery  that  his 
word  and  touch  can  cure  and  heal.  Up  to  this  point  in  Mc’s 
narrative  Jesus’  mission  seems  to  consist,  for  himself  at  least, 
in  message.  The  discovery  of  this  new  activity  of  which  he 
is  capable  gives  rise  to  a  pressingly  personal  problem  which 
drives  him  apart  for  prayer  and  petition  a  great  while  before 
day  (Me  1,35-38).  The  first  day  at  Capernaum  ended  with 
Jesus  feeling  himself  strangely  endowed,  yet  strangely  en¬ 
cumbered.  The  cures  had  thrown  a  new  light  upon  his  person. 
What  was  to  be  his  mission,  miracle  or  message? 

Mt  and  Lc  have  altered  and  changed  Mc’s  eventful  day  in 
Capernaum.  Mt  shatters  it  completely  by  reporting  only  the 
second  and  third  of  the  four  incidents  that  make  it  up;  he 
omits  the  first  and  fourth,  the  most  significant  of  the  day,  and 
reports  the  two  which  he  does  retain  in  a  meaningless  connec¬ 
tion  in  the  cycle  of  miracles  (8,11-17).  Lc  follows  the  order  of 
Me  and  reports  all  four  incidents  (1,31-43),  but  the  fourth 
he  so  tones  down  that  the  personal  point  to  it  entirely  disap¬ 
pears.  In  Lc  4,42-43  Jesus  is  merely  withdrawing  from  Cap¬ 
ernaum. 

The  above  consideration  concerning  the  baptism,  the  temp- 


204 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


tation,  and  the  first  day  in  Capernaum  go  to  show  that  the 
first  two  are  not  Messianic  incidents  in  the  life  of  Jesus;  they 
have  to  do  merely  with  Jesus’  prophetic  call  to  a  public  career 
and,  perhaps,  a  period  of  general  testing,  similar  in  character, 
but  briefer  in  extent,  to  Paul’s  retreat  in  Gal  1,17-18.  The 
Messiahship  was  for  Jesus  not  a  general  problem  of  calling  and 
career,  for  he  fulfils  neither  in  the  traditional  Messianic  sense, 
but  a  purely  personal  problem.  Me  1,85-38  shows  us  that 
Jesus’  personal  problems  begin  with  that  first  and  eventful  da}7 
in  Capernaum. 

It  is  only  as  Jesus  swings  into  the  actual  and  active  fulfill¬ 
ment  of  his  mission  that  the  possibilities  of  his  person  put  in 
their  appearance.  His  miracle-power  and  popularity  force 
him  to  reckon  with  the  possibilities,  even  with  the  probabilities, 
of  the  divine  plan  for  his  own  person.  The  fact  that  all  of 
Jesus’  retreats  to  solitude  for  prayer,  with  the  exception  of 
Gethsemane,  are  confined  to  Galilee,  and  that  all  of  them  pre¬ 
cede  Caesarea  Philippi,  with  the  exception  of  Lc  9,28f,  would 
seriously  suggest  that  they  stood  in  a  real  and  essential  rela¬ 
tion  to  the  appearance  and  development  of  his  Messianic 
consciousness.  At  the  close  of  the  day  in  Capernaum  Jesus’ 
personal  struggle  begins.  It  is  a  struggle  for  clearness  and 
certainty,  not  concerning  his  commission  and  career  as  a  pro¬ 
phet  and  preacher  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  for  concerning  this 
point  he  is  never  in  doubt,  but  regarding  the  personal  role  that 
he  is  to  play  in  the  final  realization  of  this  kingdom. 

Yon  Delius  makes  a  pertinent  point  in  this  connection :  In 
any  case  it  seems  to  me  certain  that  Jesus  must  have  struggled 
long  and  hard  regarding  the  foundation  of  his  being.  Ready , 
resplendent  superiority  is  never  the  reward  of  anything  but 
agonizing  Cyclopean  labor  in  the  depths  (S.  118). 

At  wrhat  particular  point  Jesus’  gains  clearness  and  cer¬ 
tainty  regarding  the  personal  role  he  is  to  play  in  the  final 
realization  of  the  kingdom  of  God  we  do  not  know.  But  we 
do  know  that  this  point,  according  to  Me  at  least,  lies  some¬ 
where  between  the  close  of  the  day  in  Capernaum  and  Peter’s 
confession  in  Me  8,27ff.  It  is  doubtful  whether  Jesus  gained 
this  clearness  and  certainty  at  any  particular  and  special 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


205 


moment,  or  series  of  moments,  but  at  Caesarea  Philippi  he 
knows  himself  to  be  or  destined  to  be  the  Messiah.  The  first 
phase  of  his  struggle  is  then  over  and  the  second  begins. 
Henceforth  it  is  a  struggle  of  will  and  strength  to  fulfil  the 
personal  part  that  the  divine  plan  has  appointed  him  in  the 
final  consummation  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 

Jesus'  Messianic  consciousness  was  not  a  foreign  self,  a 
kind  of  extra-ego,  that  came  to  possess  him,  but  was  a  per¬ 
sonal  development  within  his  own  consciousness  as  a  called 
prophet  and  preacher  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  As  H.  J.  Holtz- 
mann  writes :  Certain  atone  is  it  that  Jesus  at  some  time  or  other 
began  to  know  that  he  was  the  Messiah ,  that  he  came  to  the 
point  where  he  confessed  and  claimed  such  for  himself ,  and 
that  this  step  cost  him  his  life  because  in  the  general  opinion 
of  his  contemporaries  he  was  evidently  not  the  one  he  claimed 
to  be  (MBJ,  S.  49). 

Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness  forms  an  interesting  and 
instructive  contrast  to  Paul’s  apostolic  consciousness.  Paul’s 
apostolic  consciousness  clearly  dates  from  a  single  exceptional 
experience  on  the  Damascus  road.  As  Wrede  writes:  Pawl  is 
one  of  that  rare  type  of  men  whose  lives  are  clearly  cut  into 
two  halves  by  a  single  occurrence .  He  experienced  a  rupture 
that  reached  to  the  very  depths ,  he  became  another  and  lived 
henceforth  in  the  consciousness  that  he  had  become  another 
and  possessed  as  it  were  a  new  ego.  This  is,  in  and  of  itself , 
something  astonishing.  His  whole  psychic  life  was  filled  with 
an  inextinguishable  sense  of  contrast  between  once  and  now; 
it  furnished '  the  one  great  point  of  orientation  for  all  his 
thought  and  feeling,  and  it  thereby  imparted  to  his  personality 
a  compactness  and  a  conclusiveness  that  are  inaccessible  to  the 
distracting  existence  of  the  crowd  (Paulus,  S.  8). 

Paul’s  experience  on  the  Damascus  road  is  revolutionary, 
not  only  in  his  career,  but  in  his  consciousness.  From  this 
experience  everything  dated  as  before  and  after.  This  high 
moment  of  his  life  related  in  Acts  9,1-9  he  is  represented  as 
rehearsing  twice  again,  22,6-11  and  26,13-19.  He  reminisces 
upon  it  and  refers  to  it  in  his  epistles:  I  Cor  9,1  ;  15,8;  II  Cor 
4,6;  12,1;  Gal  1,16-17;  Eph  3,3;  Phil  3,12. 


206 


THE,  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


But  the  experience  at  the  Jordan  was  in  no  such  sense  revo¬ 
lutionary  in  Jesus’  self-consciousness.  He  never  rehearses  it, 
reminisces  upon  it,  or  refers  to  it.  Jesus  indulges  in  remin¬ 
iscence  but  twice,  Me  8,19  and  Lc  22,35.  There  is  no  pivotal 
or  polar  point  in  Jesus’  experience  about  which  everjflhing 
turns,  no  drawn  line  before  and  after  which  all  else  dates,  that 
corresponds  at  all  to  Paul’s  vision  before  Damascus.  This 
single  vision  furnished  to  Paul  the  credentials  for  his  Christian 
apostleship.  But  Jesus  never  refers  to  any  single  experience, 
or  series  of  experiences,  that  lies  in  the  past  as  constituting 
his  Messianic  call  and  credentials.  It  is  worthy  of  note  that 
Jesus ,  even  where  he  opposes  the  traditional  or  current  methods 
of  instruction  as  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount ,  never  referred 
like  the  prophets  to  special  visitations,  to  any  moment  what¬ 
ever  when  he  had  experienced  a  vision  or  received  a  revelation 
(Werner,  PGJ,  S.  40). 

The  pathographers  of  Jesus,  particularly  those  who  diag¬ 
nose  paranoia,  see  in  the  baptism  and  the  temptation  import¬ 
ant  moments  in  the  development  of  Jesus’  psychosis  and  delu¬ 
sions  of  consciousness,  but  neither  experience  marks  its  rise. 
They  mark  rather  the  transition  from  the  latent  to  the  active 
phase  of  his  pathological  self-consciousness.  Its  origin  lies 
back  somewhere  in  his  pre-public  life,  perhaps  at  the  psychic 
crisis  at  puberty,  and  de  Loosten  and  Binet-Sangle  trace  it 
as  far  back  as  hereditary  influence.  In  one  thing  Jesus’  path- 
ographers  are  right,  namely,  that  Jesus’  self-consciousness  did 
not  appear  ex  abrupt o  but  organically.  It  was  not  the  work 
of  a  single  moment,  or  a  single  exceptional  experience.  The 
full  answer  to  the  question  as  to  whether  Jesus’  self-conscious¬ 
ness  was  morbid  in  its  rise  can  be  given  only  in  connection  with 
the  role  that  hallucinations  played  in  his  experience  as  dis¬ 
cussed  in  the  next  paragraphs  and  the  probability  of  hereditary 
burden  as  discussed  in  the  following  chapter. 

B)  Its  Reinforcement 

By  the  reinforcement  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  we  mean 
the  role  that  hallucinations  played  in  the  support  and  encour¬ 
agement  of  Jesus’  understanding  and  estimate  of  himself.  It 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


207 


is  well  then  to  cite  a  psychiatrist’s  definition  of  the  psychic 
phenomenon  known  as  the  hallucination :  We  designate  as  hal¬ 
lucinations  those  sensations  which  appear  only  in  consequence 
of  inner  stimuli  and  without  the  excitation  of  the  sense  in  ques¬ 
tion  by  an  object  of  the  outside  world  (Binswanger,  S.  5). 

Psychological!}7  the  hallucination  is  clearly  distinguished 
over  against  the  illusion.  Visions,  however,  are  most  frequently 
religious  experiences,  and  because  of  their  almost  regular 
religious  character  and  associations  it  is  only  reluctantly  that 
popular  thought,  at  least,  has  recognized  in  the  vision  only  a 
species  of  hallucination.  But  the  strictly  scientific  point  of 
view  has  no  such  interest  in  the  content  and  connections  of  psy¬ 
chic  phenomena.  Visions  are,  therefore,  only  a  variety  of  hal¬ 
lucination.  Properly  speaking  they  figure  in  only  one  field  of 
sense,  the  visual.  In  the  more  general  understanding,  how¬ 
ever,  they  include  auditory  hallucinations.  Thus  the  vision 
at  the  baptism  would  include  hallucinations  of  both  sight  and 
hearing. 

Even  conservative  New  Testament  critics  speak  of  the  oc¬ 
casional  visions  of  Jesus,  particularly  at  the  baptism.  Liberal 
scholars,  fonder  of  psychological  emphasis,  speak  more  freely 
of  Jesus’  hallucinations,  not  numerous  yet  not  confined  to  the 
baptism.  Both  allow  these  psychic  experiences  to  influence 
Jesus  in  his  decisions  to  some  extent,  but  both  protest  against 
a  pathological  origin.  Weidel  writes:  Jesus  had  his  experi¬ 
ences,  subjective  and  objective ,  which  influenced  him  and 
brought  the  potentialities  of  his  person  to  development  (S.  20). 

J.  Weiss  expresses  his  opinion  thus:  The  view  that  it  is 
inconceivable  that  Jesus  allowed  himself  to  be  guided 
by  such  experiences  is  definitely  to  be  rejected.  The  directly 
religious  and  emotional  life  of  the  Oriental,  particularly  in 
times  of  agitations  such  as  obtained  in  the  days  of  Jesus  and 
the  Baptist,  is  much  more  liable  to  such  states  (Lc  10,18)  than 
we  are,  and  it  is  only  an  unhistorical  confusion  of  time  and 
place  that  designates  such  inspirations  as  “ morbid ”  (SdNT. 
I  446). 

The  hallucinations  of  Jesus  have  furnished  abundant  ma¬ 
terials  for  his  pathographers,  Holtzmann  speaks  only  of 


208 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


ecstatic  visions  of  Jesus ;  however,  he  regards  them  as  influ¬ 
ential  in  Jesus’  career  and  consciousness.  Rasmussen  says, 
We  do  not  know  much  about  his  hallucinations,  but  in  any  case 
no  one  is  able  to  deny  their  presence  in  his  experience  (S.  142). 
He  mentions  only  the  baptism  and  Lc  10,18.  De  Loosten  finds 
it  very  probable  that  Jesus  was  very  dependent  upon  such  hal¬ 
lucinations  as  he  had  at  the  baptism  for  his  decisions  ;  there¬ 
fore,  they  must  have  been  frequent  (S.  59).  Hirsch  knows  that 
Jesus  suffered  with  hallucinations:  that  he  “saw”  and  “heard” 
the  creations  of  his  own  morbid  imagination  (p.  112f ;  Ger.  S. 
109f).  Binet-Sangle  makes  the  most  exhaustive  study  of 
Jesus’  hallucinations  (II  346-394)  and  has  the  longest  and 
most  complete  catalogue.  He  finds  seven  hallucinations  in  the 
sources  as  they  now  stand,  but  is  sure  that  they  must  have  been 
very  numerous  in  the  experience  of  Jesus  going  back  as  early 
as  the  age  of  twelve  and  appearing  originally  as  the  product 
of  puberal  auto-intoxication.  He  further  finds  that  Jesus’ 
hallucinations  encouraged  him  in  his  delirium  and  in  the  pur¬ 
suit  of  his  vesanic  passion. 

The  number  of  Jesus’  hallucinations,  as  discovered  by  his 
pathographers,  totals  eight.  The  following  catalogue  is  prac¬ 
tically  complete  and  summarizes  the  hallucinatory  materials  to 


be  found  in  the 

sources : 

Mt 

Me 

Lc 

Field  of  sense 

Baptism 

1)  3,16-17 

1,10-11 

3,21-22 

visual 

and 

Temptation 

2)  4,3-4 

4,3-4 

auditory 

3)  5-6 

9-12 

U 

C( 

4)  8-11 

5-8 

U' 

« 

« 

5)  lib 

13b 

13c 

•  •  •  • 

<c 

Transfiguration 

6)  17,2-8 

9,2b-8 

9,29-36 

<• 

Satan’s  fall 

7)  . 

10,18 

u 

Gethsemane 

8)  . 

22,43 

« 

Binet-Sangle  .... 

....12345 

7  8 

de  Loosten  . 

. .  . .  2  3  4 

6  7 

Hirsch  . 

....1234 

6 

Rasmussen  . 

.  .  .  .1 

7 

Holtzmann  . 

....1234 

7  (ecstatic  visions) 

Hirsch  finds  that  the  very  spirit  that  drove  Jesus  into  the 
desert  was  the  product  of  an  hallucination  (p.  112;  Ger.,  S. 
109)  ;  further  he  finds  that  Jn  8,26  28  38-40  refer  to  preced¬ 
ing  hallucinations  of  sight  and  hearing.  De  Loosten  adds 
Me  3,21  22 ;  5,25-34 ;  he  regards  the  latter  incident  as  a  cut- 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


209 


aneous  hallucination  (see  page  75f)  (1).  Binet-Sangle  also 
speaks  of  kinaesthetic  hallucinations  (II  387ff).  Binet- 
Sangle,  Hirsch  and  de  Loosten  speak  of  the  illusions  of  Jesus  ; 
the  first  of  his  pseudo-hallucinations. 

From  the  pathographers  point  of  view  the  Gospel  of  Lc 
is  richest  in  hallucinatory  materials  since  7  and  8  are  pecu¬ 
liar  to  the  third  Gospel.  Lc  omits  the  ministering  angels  in 
the  temptation  scene  (5)  and  the  appearance  of  the  wild  beasts 
which  is  peculiar  to  Me  (13b  of  5).  Me  1,13b,  however,  has 
nothing  to  do  with  hallucinations  or  any  sort  of  psychic  ex¬ 
perience.  It  is  simply  one  of  Mc?s  characteristic  narrative 
details  added  to  make  the  picture  of  solitude  more  graphic. 
Our  previous  study  of  the  biographical  incidents  from  the 
pathographic  point  of  view  eliminates  2,  3,  4,  5,  6,  and  8  as 
usable  pathographic  matter.  As  to  1  there  is  no  need  of 
doubting  or  denying  that  Jesus  experienced  a  vision  at  the 
baptism.  7  alone  requires  discussion  here. 

Lc  10,18  reads:  And  he  said  unto  tdiem,  I  helield  Satan 
fallen  as  lightning  from  heaven.  On  this  word  of  Jesus  pecu¬ 
liar  to  Lc  Holtzmann  writes:  Jesus  answers  the  jubilant  re¬ 
port  of  the  returning  disciples  by  referring  to  a  vision  he  had 


experienced . Such  is  ecstatic  for  it  transcends  the  com¬ 

pass  of  human  conceptions.  To  this  is  attached  an  ecstatic 

promise . Both  utterances  transcend  the  measure  of  man 

(W  JE,  S.  15,  Anm.  1)  (2).  Rasmussen  (S.  142)  and  de 


Loosten  (S.  61)  class  Lc  10,18  as  an  hallucination;  Binet- 
Sangle  describes  it  as  une  hallucination  haute  et  lumineuse 
(II  382 ff). 


(1)  Against  de  Loosten  on  this  particular  point  (Me  5,25-34)  Schweitzer 
writes:  In  reality  Jesus  only  verified  the  fact  that  someone  had  touched 
his  garment.  That  he  did  this  because  he  had  felt  power  go  out  from  him 
is  a  naive  conjecture  of  the  evangelist  (PBJ,  S.  8,  Anm.  4)i 

(2)  Two  years  before  Holtzmann  found  an  historical  explanation  suf¬ 
ficient:  In  a  picture  of  Jewish  apocalyptic  known  to  him  from  youth  up 

Jesus  declares  to  them : . (Lc  10,18).  It  is  an  allusion  to  a  bit  of 

primitive  mythology  well  known  to  Semitics  and  Indo-Europeans,  accord¬ 
ing  to  which  the  enemy  of  the  gods  scales  his  way  up  to  their  very  moun¬ 
tain  only  from  there  to  be  hurled  again  ignominiously  into  the  abyss.  It 
is  with  this  picture  that  Jesus  described  the  success  of  the  disciples’ 
preaching  of  repentance  (LJ,  S.  219). 


210 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Wellhausen  regards  Lc  10,18  as  apocryphal:  The  “ see¬ 
ing ”  of  the  incident  could  he  conceived  as  a  vision  of  Jesus  and 
explained  in  the  light  of  Isa.  14,12  (Rev.  12,9).  But  for  this 
the  saying  is  too  dull  and  incomplete ;  besides,  everything  vis¬ 
ionary  (though  not  every  emotion )  is  otherwise  kept  at  a  dis¬ 
tance  from  Jesus .  In  any  case,  I  regard  this  isolated 

word  as  wholly  apocryphal  (Lucae,  S.  5Qf).  H.  J.  Holtzmann 
finds  here  a  vision  of  Jesus  analogous  to  Me  1,10  (HC,  I  359)  ; 
J.  Weiss  also  speaks  of  a  vision  of  Jesus  (SdNT,  I  446). 

But  this  word  of  Jesus  is  rather  to  be  understood  in  the 
light  of  its  connections.  It  merely  expresses  in  a  figurative 
fashion  his  elation  over  the  success  of  the  seventy.  The  ad¬ 
dress  of  Jesus  to  the  twelve  on  sending  them  out  stood  in  both 
Me  and  Q,  but  in  a  quite  different  form.  Me  and  Mt  know 
of  only  one  mission  of  the  disciples  and  consequently  have  only 
one  address.  Mc’s  brief  address  is  found  in  6,7-12.  Mt,  how¬ 
ever,  combines  the  Marcan  and  Q  addresses  into  one  long  ad¬ 
dress  delivered  to  the  twelve  in  10.1-11,1.  Lc  keeps  the  two 
forms  of  the  address  separate  and  consequently  has  two  mis¬ 
sions  ;  he  has  the  Marcan  address  delivered  to  the  twelve  in 
9,1-6,  and  the  Q  address  to  the  seventy  in  10,1-16.  Two  of 
the  Synoptists  tell  us  of  the  return  of  the  twelve  and  the  success 
of  their  mission ;  two  of  them  report  but  a  single  reminiscence, 
Me  9,38=Lc  9,49.  Lc,  however,  tells  of  the  jubilant  return 
and  report  of  the  seventy  in  10,17,  and  this  supplies  abundant 
occasion  for  the  figurative  word  of  Jesus  in  10,18  without 
resorting  to  either  normal  or  abnormal  psychology  for  an 
explanation. 

In  fact,  Jesus’  word  in  Lc  10,18  is  closely  analogous  to 
the  three  temptations  of  Mt  and  Lc.  It  furnishes  the  best  key 
to  the  understanding  of  the  three  temptations  as  going  back 
originally  to  figurative  words  of  Jesus  to  his  disciples  con¬ 
cerning*  victorious  contests  with  Satan.  There  he  tells  the  dis- 
c-iples  that  he  has  triumphed  over  Satan ;  here  he  tells  them 
that  they  have  done  the  same  by  their  preaching  and  healing 
tour. 

Returning,  then,  to  the  role  that  hallucinations  or  visions 
played  in  the  reinforcement  and  encouragement  of  Jesus’  self- 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


211 


consciousness  we  find  again  an  interesting  contrast  in  the  case 
of  Paul.  Not  to  refer  to  his  experience  on  the  Damascus  road, 
we  know  that  Paul,  if  we  are  to  believe  the  book  of  Acts,  had 
his  visions,  trances,  and  dreams  at  important  junctures  in  his 
career  and  that  he  acted  according  to  their  indications  (Acts 
16,9:  [=11  Cor  2,12-13]  ;  18,9-10;  22,17-21;  23,11;  27,23; 
Gal  2,2).  Weinel  writes:  We  know  that  at  decisive  hours  in 
his  life  Paul  had  visions  and  that  at  certain  important  moments 
he  was  guided  by  dreams  (Paulus,  S.  52)  ;  A.  Deissman,  Dreams 
become  for  him  divine  suggestions  (S.  57)  ;  W.  Wrede,  His  own 
reflections  were  converted  into  revelations ,  or  the  revelations 
in  turn  roused  him  to  decisions  (Paulus,  S.  16). 

Jesus’  self-consciousness  did  not  originate  in  visions  or 
hallucinations,  nor  was  it  supported,  reinforced,  bolstered  up, 
or  regulated  by  them.  Jesus  may  have  had  his  visions  and 
inner  experiences,  such  as  that  at  the  baptism,  but  they  never 
had  a  regulative  or  reassuring  influence  either  in  his  conduct 
or  consciousness.  He  never  shows  himself  morbidly  dependent 
upon  them  at  important  junctures  in  his  public  career. 

In  concluding  our  study  of  Jesus’  visions  or  hallucinations 
it  is  well  to  cite  the  statement  of  three  medical  experts  concern¬ 
ing  this  psychic  phenomenon,  when  occasional  and  isolated,  as  a 
svmptom  of  a  pathological  psychic  constitution.  Of  the  church’s 
saints,  whose  biographies  and  confessions  are  infinitely  richer 
in  visions,  etc.,  than  are  our  records  of  Jesus,  Dr.  Moerehen 
writes:  We  must  guard  ourselves  against  drawing  too  extreme 
conclusions  from  the  analogies  between  saintliness  and  morbid 
depressions  (PH,  S.  20).  In  defense  of  the  psychic  soundness 
of  the  old  prophets  in  general  and  of  Ezekiel  in  particular, 
Dr.  Dieckhoff  says:  It  would  be  overhasty  and  incorrect  to 
conclude  at  once  the  existence  of  some  psychic  malady  simply 
because  of  the  presence  of  these  illusions  of  sense.  It  is  true 
that  we  find  such  usually  as  the  symptoms  of  psychic  disorders , 
but  they  are  also  to  be  met  in  psychically  sound  persons ,  pre¬ 
cisely  in  the  psychically  elite  (S.  200).  Exactly  to  our  present 
point  Dr.  Binswanger  urges:  In  recent  times  the  effort  is  in 
vogue  to  stamp  the  heroes  of  religious  history,  in  particular 
Mohammed ,  the  Apostle  Paul,  Martin  Luther,  and  even  Jesus 


212 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


( E .  Rasmussen) ,  psychopaths,  hysterics  and  epileptics  be¬ 
cause  they  occasionally  experienced  more  or  less  reliably  at¬ 
tested  hallucinations.  To  this  point  let  it  be  remarked  that 
the  occurrence  of  isolated  hallucinations  or  illusions  is  by  no 
means  a  proof  of  the  existence  of  a  psychic  disorder ,  or  even 
of  a  psychopathic  constitution.  Under  the  influence  of  long 
continued  physical  privation  (fasting),  psychic  over-exertion , 
especially  in  states  of  strongly  roused  emotions  (religio- ecsta¬ 
tic  moods)  hallucinations  can  appear  in  psychically  sound  per¬ 
sons  (S.  8). 

As  a  psychosensorial  process  the  hallucination  is  abnormal ; 
it  is  due  to  a  disturbed  psychic  function  under  abnormal  con¬ 
ditions  (Krafft-Ebing,  p.  101).  When  taken  seriously  and  held 
as  true,  hallucinations  falsify  both  the  objective  and  subjective 
consciousness  (p.  95).  When  chronic  they  lead  to  mental  im¬ 
poverishment  and  result  in  a  complete  clouding  of  consciousness. 
The  judgment  is  overpowered  (Kraepelin,  p.  9)  and  the  ordin¬ 
ary  psychic  correctives  exercised  upon  the  elements  of  experi¬ 
ence  are  swept  aside.  Hallucinations  are  of  paramount  impor¬ 
tance  in  the  formation  of  delusions  to  which  they  give  certain 
definite  forms  and  appropriate  expression  (Binswanger,  S. 
34f).  They  render  the  patient  incapable  of  withdrawing  from 
their  influence  and  regulate  his  conduct,  if  aggressive  they  spur 
him  on  to  action  according  to  their  indications. 

Krafft-Ebing  says  that  the  French  view  which  regards  hal¬ 
lucinations  as  signs  of  insanity  is  without  justification;  for,  in 
the  first  place,  an  hallucination,  even  when  it  is  regarded  as  an 
actual  fact,  is  only  an  elementary  phenomenon  that  reveals  no¬ 
thing  concerning  the  general  state  of  the  individual,  and  no¬ 
thing  concerning  the  condition  of  the  brain;  and,  in  the  second 
place,  experience  offers  us  examples  of  many  persons  who  have 
believed  in  the  reality  of  their  hallucinations  but  who  could  not 
be  regarded  as  insane  (Mohammed,  Napoleon,  Socrates,  Pascal , 
Jean  d’Arc,  Luther).  The  explanation  of  this  is  not  difficult , 
when  it  is  remembered  that  such  hallucinated  persons  controlled 
by  the  delusions  and  superstitions  of  their  time,  or  by  the  tend¬ 
ency  to  the  belief  in  wonders  and  mysticism,  were  not  disposed 
to  correct  these  creations  of  their  imagination . But 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


213 


nevertheless  we  must  hold  fast  to  the  fact  that  hallucinations 
that  are  held  to  be  true  are  manifestations  that  endanger  the  in¬ 
tegrity  of  relations  to  the  actual  world  (p.  109f). 

Hallucinations . are  not  in  themselves  decisive  as  to  the 

existence  of  insanity.  The  most  that  they  can  prove  is  the  ex¬ 
istence  of  an  abnormal  cerebral  condition.  Their  significance 
as  one  of  the  symptoms  of  a  psychosis  depends  upon  the  demons 
stration  of  the  existence  of  a  psychosis.  Hallucinations  appear 
in  their  true  light  only  when  they  stand  in  relation  to  the  other 
elementary  disturbances  ( depression ,  attacks  of  anxiety ,  etc.), 
and  in  the  disturbed  state  of  consciousness  are  no  longer  cor¬ 
rected  and  exercise  influence  on  action  (Krafft-Ebing,  p.  238). 

C)  Its  Form 

Jesus’  acceptance  of  the  Messianic  title  gives  rise  to  a  seri¬ 
ous  psychological  problem.  Loofs  has  stated  this  problem  well: 
To  say  the  least ,  the  Messianic  consciousness  comprises  within 
itself  of  necessity  an  extraordinary  enhancement  of  self-con¬ 
sciousness.  Indeed  it  makes  us  almost  dizzy  when  we  realize  how 
much  it  meant  for  Jesus  to  regard  himself  as  the  Messiah  (S. 
151).  Werner  states  the  problem  from  the  psychopathic  angle: 
This  self-consciousness  transcends  everything  that  a 
psychically  sound  person,  even  though  he  be  one  of  the  greatest , 
can  think  of  himself  (PGJ,  S.  11).  Such  an  exalted  estimate 
of  his  own  ego  as  is  implied  in  Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness 
involves  certain  striking  features  which  transcend  and  cannot 
be  compelled  within  the  confines  and  compass  of  common  human 
consciousness  and  which  demand  an  explanation. 

Jesus’  pathographers  have  not  been  slow  in  finding  this  ex¬ 
planation  ;  they  speak  of  his  megalomania,  delirium,  and  de¬ 
lusions  of  grandeur.  In  Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness  they 
find  evidences  of  his  psychic  degeneration  par  excellence.  But 
before  going  over  to  the  psychopathic  phase  of  the  question, 
and  this  is  the  extent  of  our  present  interest  in  Jesus’  Messianic 
consciousness,  it  might  be  well  to  note  how  various  camps  of 
theologians  have  met  the  problem. 

The  conservative  camp  is  represented  by  Loofs  who  sees  no 


THE,  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


211 

hope  of  an  historical  solution  of  Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness. 
He  takes  the  purely  confessional  and  christological  position. 
If  an  understanding  of  the  historical  person  of  Jesus  is  to  he 
reached  at  all ,  this  possibility  can  he  realized  hy  faith  alone 
(S.  172).  What  the  historian  as  such  cannot  do,  faith  can. 
Faith  can  compose  o  n  e  picture  which  historical  research  is  not 
in  a  position  to  assemble  (S.  222).  This  formulary  can  in  real¬ 
ity  do  justice  to  both,  namely ,  the  real  humanity  of  Jesus  and 
his  self-consciousness  which  completely  transcends  the  limits  of 
the  finite :  it  fits  the  faith  that  Jesus  was,  on  the  one  hand,  the 
most  perfect  revelation  of  God  and ,  on  the  other  hand,  at  the 
same  time  the  originator  of  a  new  humanity  (S.  244). 

A  second  position  regarding  Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness 
is  that  of  source-scepticism  as  represented  by  Wrede  and  Well- 
hausen.  Wrede  maintains  that  Jesus  never  held  himself  to  be, 
nor  gave  himself  out  to  be  the  Messiah.  His  Messiahship  is  the 
work  of  primitive  Christian  faith  as  the  result  of  the  resurrec¬ 
tion  experiences.  It  is  only  with  the  resurrection  that  Jesus  be¬ 
comes  the  Messiah  (MGE,  S.  213).  The  Messianic  conscious¬ 
ness  and  confessions  of  Jesus  in  Me  are  unhistorical ;  they  are 
simply  read  back  into  Me  in  view  of  the  earliest  Christian  Easter 
experiences  and  faith.  Wellhausen  allows  it  as  possible  that 
Jesus  confessed  his  Messiahship  before  the  high  priest,  but 
his  Messianic  consciousness  played  little  or  no  role  in  what  Jesus 
considered  his  mission  and  message.  The  sources,  even  Me,  are 
too*  strongly  christianized  to  enable  us  to  get  anything  like  an 
historical  picture  of  Jesus.  Jesus  never  spoke  to  his  disciples 
of  his  passion,  resurrection,  or  parousia  (1). 

The  large  group  of  liberal  theologians  sees  in  Jesus  first 
and  last  the  great  preacher  and  prophet  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 
He  is  not  consumed  in  the  personal  role  that  he  is  to  play  in  the 
realization  of  this  kingdom,  but  in  the  kingdom  itself  and  its 
coming.  They  recognize  an  eschatological  element  in  Jesus’ 
teaching,  but  with  few  exceptions  find  it  of  no  essential  im¬ 
portance  in  the  understanding  of  Jesus’  person  and  career. 

(1)  Als  siclier  lcann  gelten,  class,  menu  Jesus  seine  Juenger  nicht  einmal 
zum  voraus  ueber  sein  Leiden  und  Auferstehn  belehrt  hat,  so  erst  recht 
nicht  ueber  seine  Parusie  (Einl.,  S.  96). 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


2 15 


They  allow  freely  his  Messianic  consciousness  as  confessed  at 
Caesarea  Philippi  and  during  his  trial.  This  consciousness, 
however,  is  to  be  construed  and  conceived  within  the  compass  of 
common  human  consciousness.  Its  form  is  zeitgeschichtlich 
comprehensible.  The  charges  of  Loofs  and  Werner  against 
this  purely  human  and  historical  interpretation  of  Jesus’  self- 
consciousness  was  presented  above,  p.  391  f.  Against  the 
liberals  Werner  further  writes:  Ever  so  high  titles  may  he  as¬ 
cribed  to  him ,  but  it  is  and  remains  an  unparalleled  fanaticism, 
the  counterpart  of  which  is  to  be  found  only  in  institutions  for 
the  insane,  when  he  makes  himself  the  future  judge  of  the  whole 
human  race  and  presents  the  prospect  of  his  imminent  triumph¬ 
ant  return  on  the  clouds  of  heaven  (PGJ,  S.  Id).  If  he  had  no 
right  to  do  this  ( forgive  sins,  etc.),  then  the  chief  testimony 
is  given  for  the  indictment  against  his  psychic  health.  Such  an 
immeasurable  self -exaltation,  of  which  he  is  thereby  guilty,  is 
unquestionably  of  morbid  origin.  This  conclusion  is  unavoid¬ 
able.  Over  the  whole  psychic  life  of  Jesus  the  measure  is  broken. 
Jesus  teas  a  thoroughly  morbid  mind  (PGJ,  S.  11). 

Conservative  and  consequent  eschatology  is  respectively  rep¬ 
resented  by  J.  Weiss  and  A.  Schweitzer.  The  latter  finds  the 
eschatological  element  in  Jesus’  words  and  deeds  to  be  exclus¬ 
ively  essential  to  the  understanding  of  him.  Eschatology  alone 
explains  his  self-consciousness,  conduct,  and  career ;  all  are  dir¬ 
ectly  dominated  by  his  eschatological  conception  of  the  king¬ 
dom  of  God  and  his  own  person.  As  we  have  pointed  out  above, 
both  conservatives  and  liberals  charge  Schweitzer  with  sur¬ 
rendering,  or  at  least  imperiling  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus 
(see  above  p.  119f).  To  these  charges  may  be  added  that  of 
Loofs,  who  writes  of  Schweitzer’s  Jesus  of  eschatology,  Jesus 
is  for  him  a  man  of  our  history,  a  man  who  with  mistaken 
thoughts  allowed  himself  to  be  filled  with  the  Messianic  hope  and 
who  with  his  Messianic  hope  came  to  shipwreck  (S.  29).  Thus 
construed  the  self-consciousness  of  Jesus  strongly  resembles 
that  of  an  abnormal  person.  Even  if  this  abnormality  does  not 
fit  into  any  psychiatric  scheme ,  Jesus  nevertheless  belongs 
in  the  fanatics'  corner  whither  the  historian  must  banish  many 


21 6 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


men  and  women  whose  psychic  health  ( in  the  psychiatric  sense ) 
and  moral  integrity  he  does  not  in  the  least  ccdl  in  question  (S. 

127). 

Turning  to  the  Synoptic  sources  themselves  we  find  that 
eschatology  constituted  an  essential  element  in  the  discourses 
and  words  of  Jesus.  The  following  is  not  an  exhaustive  list, 
but  it  does  include  the  principal  passages :  Mt  10,23b ;  Mt 
16,27-28=Mc  8,38b-9  ,l=Lc  9,26b-27 ;  Mt  19,28=Lc  22,28- 
30;  Mt  22,30=Mc  12,25=Lc  20,35;  Mt  21,30-36=Mc  13, 
26,32=Lc  21,27-33;  Mt  21,37-ll=Lc  17,26-27  31-35;  Mt 
26-29=Mc  ll,25=Lc  22,18;  Mt  26,6!=Mc  ll,62=Lc  22,69. 
The  parables  in  Mt  21,!2-ll=Lc  12,39-10;  Mt  21,15-51=^ 
Lc  12,12-16;  Mt  25,1-13  31-16  are  eschatological  in  thought 
but  have  acquired  a  decidedly  early  Christian  character. 

Whether  or  not  one  agrees  with  the  extreme  eschatological 
emphasis  of  Schweitzer,  or  accepts  his  long  list' of  eschatological 
words,  acts  and  sacraments,  or  his  Intermsethik  (GdLJF,  S. 
390-113),  the  abundance  of  the  references  in  the  preceding 
paragraph  shows  that  eschatology  was  an  essential  element  in 
Jesus’  thought  and  teaching. 

But  our  problem  is  not  to  be  solved  by  citing  references,  for 
we  do  not  know  just  what  type  of  eschatology  was  current  and 
how  widely  it  obtained  in  Jesus’  day.  Even  Schweitzer  himself 
states  that  we  have  no  sources  to  assure  us  whether  the  popular 
eschatological  hopes  of  Jesus’  contemporaries  were  prophetic, 
apocalyptic  in  the  later  Judaic  sense,  or  Christian.  He  candidly 
admits  that  his  own  sketch  is  only  an  attempt  at  a  reconstruc¬ 
tion  and  is  largely  conjecture.  H.  J.  Holtzmann  sums  the 
matter  up  well:  It  is  very  doubtful  whether  the  conception  of  the 
Messiah  at  the  time  of  Jesus  existed  in  the  form  of  a  regularly 
stamped  coin  of  universally  recognized  currency  (MBJ,  S.  15, 
Anm.  1). 

Although  we  are  not  sure  as  to  the  exact  character  and  ex¬ 
tent  of  the  eschatological  hopes  of  Jesus’  day,  we  do  know  that 
his  eschatology,  his  picture  of  the  future,  was  not  a  picture 
peculiar  to  himself,  but  was  a  picture  painted  before  him  as 
early  as  Dan.  7,13  and  that  it  was  not  shared  by  Jesus  alone, 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


217 


but  bj  many  of  his  own  people  of  his  own  day  (1). 
That  Jesus’  view  was  a  common  view  is  clear  from  the 
fact  that  he  no  more  finds  it  necessary  to  explain  or 
define  it  than  he  does  the  notion  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 
He  simply  refers  to  it,  perhaps  in  somewhat  more  glow¬ 
ing  terms,  as  a  well-known  element  in  the  religious  acumen  and 
atmosphere  of  his  day  and  people.  How  widely  this  view  ob¬ 
tained,  or  was  entertained  by  Jesus’  national  contemporaries 
cannot  be  determined  ;  the  sources  are  too  inadequate.  But  they 
do  attest  that  when  Jesus  spoke  of  the  future  in  such  glowing 
terms  his  teaching  was  not  new  and  strange,  but  well  enough 
understood  to  dispense  with  definition.  It  wTas  a  picture  so  vividly 
visualized  by  Jesus’  disciples  that  they  even  engaged  in  a 
dispute  as  to  their  respective  roles  in  the  future  and  requested 
reservations  for  prominent  places  (Me  10,35ff).  They  had  but 
two  questions  to  ask:  Where?  (Lc  13,39),  and  When?  (Me 
13,4). 

This  fantastic  view  of  the  future  in  Jesus’  day,  though  very 
foreign  to  us,  cannot  be  looked  upon  as  a  psychopathic  pro¬ 
duct  of  the  popular  mind.  Dr.  Dieckhoff  gives  a  significant 
statement  on  this  point:  The  greatest  of  errors  have  at  times 
been  accepted  as  incontestably  correct ,  also  by  the  wisest  and 
the  most  intelligent .  One  needs  only  to  recall  the  belief  in 
witches :  the  men  of  the  sixteenth  century  were  just  as  psychic¬ 
ally  sound  as  we,  and  yet  they  entertained  ideas  and  prejudices 
so  absurd  and  inhuman  that  they  are  quite  inconceivable  to  us 
(S.  201). 

Even  if  we  knew  more  about  the  popular  eschatological  con¬ 
ceptions  of  Jesus’  day,  we  would  still  not  be  sure  of  exactly  what 
they  meant  for  him.  As  Schweitzer  says :  We  possess  no  psy¬ 
chology  of  the  Messiah  (GdLJF,  S.  9).  We  still  less  possess  a 
psychology  of  Jesus.  But  that  his  view  of  the  future  was  not 
paranoiac  is  clear  from  the  fact  that  not  he  alone  but  many  of 


(1)  In  making  an  estimate  of  a  man  from  the  psychological  and  psycho- 
pathological  point  of  view  it  is  of  greatest  importance  to  know  what  are 
the  circumstances  of  life,  the  cultural  and  moral  views  of  the  time  as  well 
as  of  the  immediate  environment  in  which  he  lives  (Weber,  Sp.  232). 


218 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


his  contemporaries  held  it.  In  order  that  a  view  be  psycho¬ 
pathic,  in  this  instance  paranoiac,  it  must  exhibit  such  eccentric 
peculiarities  that  it  departs  from  the  common  view  to  the  degree 
of  abnormality.  Such  cannot  be  proven,  in  fact  the  exact  op¬ 
posite  is  evident,  as  regards  Jesus’  view  of  the  future. 

There  is  no  reason  why  Jesus  should  not  share  the  views  of 
his  contemporaries  on  this  point.  His  very  historicity  and  our 
own  historical  judgment  demand  it.  The  offense  is  not  old,  but 
modern.  As  Schweitzer  says,  modern  Christianity  fears  the  all- 
too-historical  Jesus,  for  he  registers  a  condemnation  unpleas¬ 
ant  to  the  comfortable  modern  view  of  Christianity.  It  makes 
Jesus  too  enthusiastic  and  too  confident  for  modern  Christian¬ 
ity  to  feel  at  ease  and  still  profess  cliscipleship.  It  reminds 
modern  Christianity  of  its  losses  and  relapses  from  the  religion 
of  Jesus.  It  is  much  more  comfortable  to  confess  to  a  religion 
about  Jesus  than  it  is  to  strive  to  live  the  religion  of  Jesus  after 
him.  The  apostles’  creed  is  easily  repeated,  but  to  believe  what 
Jesus  believed  and  to  believe  as  he  believed  is  a  very  different 
task.  To  believe  that  there  actually  is  a  kingdom  of  God,  that 
it  is  of  and  from  God,  that  it  can  and  will  come,  and  that  soon, 
and  to  devote  one’s  life  to  the  preparing  of  one’s  self  and  others 
for  its  coming  to  the  extent  of  exhausting  one’s  life  in  its  ser¬ 
vice,  that  is  the  religion  and  faith  of  Jesus. 

One  of  Jesus’  chief  gifts  to  his  followers  was  the  gift  of 
imagination.  Jesus  visualized  the  future,  not  as  we  would  visu¬ 
alize  it  to  be  sure,  but  in  such  a  way  as  appealed  to  the  popular 
imagination  of  his  day.  He,  further,  visualized  the  future  so 
vividly  that  it  gave  him  no  minute  of  rest,  it  drove  him  apart 
for  prayer,  and  was  a  constant  spur  to  his  present.  As  Renan 
said,  Jesus  is  the  man  who  believed  most  energetically  of  all  in 
the  reality  of  the  ideal  (S.  185).  Jesus’  habit  of  living  in  the 
future  and  in  the  terms  of  the  future  is  not  a  symptom  of  para¬ 
noia,  or  any  other  psychosis,  but  is  his  gift  of  imagination,  a 
gift  by  which  the  world  is  not  only  inspired  but  led  to  progress. 
Modern  Christianity  has  not  inherited  Jesus’  gift  of  imagin¬ 
ation. 

Jesus’  view  of  the  future  as  God’s  and  as  of  vital  concern 
in  matters  of  present  conduct  and  coming  destiny  for  each  in- 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS  219 

dividual  is  not  the  peculiarity  of  a  paranoiac,  but  the  very  es¬ 
sence  of  Christianity.  In  this  respect  Rothenburg  is  more  con¬ 
sistent  in  discarding  both  Christianity  and  Jesus  than  are 
Schweitzer’s  critics  who  will  remain  Christian  yet  discard  es¬ 
chatology  as  degenerating  Jesus  and  who  will  leave  him  to  be 
the  teacher  of  a  set  of  morals  and  ethics  reactionary  in  his  own 
day  but  pleasant  to  the  modern  conscience.  The  eschatology 
of  Jesus’  ethics  is  as  reactionary  as  ever  and  Jesus’  true  disciple 
today  can  never  feel  at  ease  as  long  as  social  and  individual  evils 
are  never  out  of  his  sight.  To  eliminate  the  eschatological  ele¬ 
ment  from  Jesus’  teaching  and  person  is  to  strip  him  of  his 
power  and  influence.  To  be  sure,  our  picture  of  the  future  will 
differ  as  widely  from  his  as  the  first  from  the  twentieth  century. 
But  we  must  share  his  view  that  there  is  a  future,  that  God  has 
great  and  good  things  in  store  for  it,  and  that  this  future  de¬ 
mands  service  and  sacrifice  in  the  present.  Most  of  all,  we 
must  share  his  zeal  and  passion  in  working  toward  it  if  we  are 
to  remain  his  disciples. 

Eschatology  with  reservations  has  its  evident  elements  of 
strength:  1)  it  is  conservative  in  its  use  of  the  sources;  2)  it 
leaves  Jesus  to  live  seriousty  and  genuinely  in  his  own  day  and 
time;  3)  it  also  offers  what  Strauss  called  in  his  1835  Lehen 
Jesu  “ true  and  splendid  elements ”  (I  551)  which  are  not  to 
be  underestimated;  I)  it  pays  a  tremendous  tribute  to  Jesus 
himself  in  that  it  shows  that  primitive,  and  essential,  Christian¬ 
ity  was  not  committed  to  the  formal  fulfillment  of  any  one  par¬ 
ticular  word  of  Jesus,  but  to  his  Person  and  cause. 

D)  Its  Content,  Control,  and  Confession 

It  is  in  this  connection  that  Binet-Sangle  and  Hirsch  com¬ 
mit  the  gravest  of  their  historical  errors.  They  represent  Jesus 
as  believing  in  his  own  divinity,  and  the  winning  of  others  over 
to  this  vesanic  conviction  as  the  sole  content  of  his  message  and 
the  intent  of  his  mission.  This  view  they,  of  course,  gather 
from  the  Fourth  Gospel  where  the  whole  content  of  Jesus’  mes¬ 
sage  is  his  own  person  and  its  prerogatives,  and  where  he  is  rep¬ 
resented  as  confessing  his  divine  dignity  in  an  indiscriminate 
and  uncontrolled  manner  before  both  friend  and  foe. 


220 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


But  the  problem  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  in  the  Synoptic 
Gospels  is  a  very  different  one.  The  fact  that  Jesus  has  so 
little  to  say  about  himself  in  the  Synoptic  sources  creates  one  of 
the  most  hopeless  problems  of  New  Testament  criticism,  namely, 
What  did  Jesus  think  of  himself?  The  answers  to  this  question 
can  be  at  best  not  more  than  tentative  historical  reconstruc¬ 
tions.  These  answers  do  not  concern  us  seriously  here.  Our 
question  is,  Is  Jesus’  self-consciousness  as  represented  in  the 
Synoptic  sources  pathological  in  its  content,  control,  and  con¬ 
fession  or  claims? 

The  content  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness  in  the  first  three 


Gospels  is  not  his  own  person,  its  prerogatives,  and  pretentions. 
Jesus  is  not  consumed  in  his  own  ego,  but  in  the  great  cause  of 
the  kingdom  of  God  which  he  champions  even  to  the  cross.  The 
kingdom  of  God  is  the  theme  of  his  preaching  and  teaching,  of 
his  every  prophecy,  parable,  and  prayer.  His  own  ego  he  re¬ 
legates  so  completely  to  the  background  that  it  is  a  hopeless 
task  to  try  to  ascertain  what  and  how  he  esteemed  himself.  From 
the  beginning  to  the  end  the  kingdom  of  God,  of  which  he  is  the 
preacher  and  the  prophet,  remains  in  the  foreground  of  his  mis¬ 
sion  and  message.  As  H.  J.  Holtzmann  writes  :  The  Messianic 
question  was  neither  distinctive  for  the  personal  piety  of  Jesus 
nor  of  central  significance  in  his  message  (MBJ,  S.  76). 

Our  previous  discussion  of  the  egocentric  words  of  Jesus 
made  it  clear  that  Jesus  never  set  confessional  conditions  for 


entrance  into  or  participation  in  the  kingdom  of  God.  His  re¬ 
quirements  were  the  rigid  requirements  of  moral  and  ethical 


Mt  7,21-23 

Not  everyone  that  saith  unto 
me,  Lord,  Lord  shall  enter 
into  the  kingdom  of  heaven ; 
but  he  that  doeth  the  will 
of  my  Father  who  is  in  hea¬ 
ven.  Many  will 

say  to  me  in  that  day,  Lord, 
Lord,  did  we  not  prophecy  by 
thy  name,  and  by  thy  name 
cast  out  demons,  and  by  thy 
name  do  many  mighty  works? 
And  then  will  I  prophecy 
unto  them ,  I  never  knew 
you ;  depart  from  me, 

ye  that  work,  iniquity. 


Lc  6,46 

Why  call  ye 
me,  Lord,  Lord, 

and  do  not  the  things 
which  I  say?  13,26-27 

Then  shall  ye  begin 

to  say, 

we  did  eat  and  drink 
in  thy  presence,  and  thou 
didst  teach  us  in  our  streets 
And  he  shall  say,  I  tell 

you,  I  know  not  whence 
ye  are;  depart  from  me,  all 
ye  workers  of  iniquity. 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


221 


conduct  as  is  evinced  by  numerous  passages  in  the  Synoptics,  of 
which  the  passage  on  the  preceding  page  is  a  striking  example. 

Here  we  see  clearly  what  Jesus  regards  as  the  essence  of 
religion.  It  is  not  confession  to  his  person,  or  the  person 
of  any  other,  but  moral  and  ethical  conduct.  In  Lc  6,46 
Jesus  says  that  it  is  absurd  to  call  him  Lord,  Lord,  and  do  not 
the  things  which  he  says.  In  Mt.  7,21  it  is  impossible  to  enter 
into  the  kingdom  of  God  unless  one  performs  the  will  of  the 
Father  who  is  in  heaven.  In  Mt  the  pretendants  base  their 
claims  upon  the  efficient  way  in  which  they  have  used  the  name 
of  Jesus  ;  in  Lc  upon  their  personal  associations  with  him.  Here 
Jesus  ascribes  a  very  subordinate  role  to  his  person  in  deciding 
the  issues  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  Jesus  even  warns  against 
confession  to  his  person  as  a  dangerous  self-delusion. 

Jesus’  Messianic  consciousness  was  his  own  private  and  per¬ 
sonal  problem.  Its  solution  and  issue  never  seriously  altered 
the  content  of  his  message,  although  it  greatly  increased  the 
demands  upon  his  mission.  The  prominence  of  the  part  that  he 
was  to  play  in  the  final  realization  of  the  kingdom  of  God  never 
caused  him  to  parade  his  person  and  neglect  his  cause  and  call¬ 
ing  as  a  preacher  and  prophet  of  that  kingdom.  It  rather  led 
him  to  warn  against  too  exclusive  attachment  to  his  person  and 
to  insist  more  emphatically  than  ever  upon  rigorous  religious 
conduct.  His  self-consciousness  brought  him  to  a  still  more 
serious  conception  of  his  calling,  for  a  more  serious  and  earn¬ 
est  tone  enters  into  his  words  as  he  strikes  in  upon  a  new  course 
of  action  after  the  confession  at  Caesarea  Philippi. 

Jesus,  in  clear  contradiction  to  the  paranoiac  character, 
was  not  consumed  with  the  claims  of  his  own  consciousness  but 
with  the  chief  cause  which  he  championed,  the  kingdom  of  God. 
He  did  not  advertise  his  person,  nor  did  he  force  himself  upon 
others  in  the  matter  of  his  dignity.  He  challenged  his  hearers 
to  believe  with  him  rather  than  on  or  in  him.  It  was  only  most 
rarely,  reluctantly,  and  reservedly  that  he  spoke  of  himself. 
Even  the  highest  pretentions  regarding  the  personal  role  that 
was  destined  for  him  in  the  future  were  subjected  and  subordin¬ 
ated  to  the  divine  will. 

Whatever  may  have  been  its  content  Jesus  subjected  his  self- 


222 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


consciousness  to  the  most  consciousness  control.  He  seems 
to  have  felt  restricted  and  restrained  rather  than  refreshed  and 
rejuvenated  by  it.  It  pressed  him  apart  to  prayer  and  peti¬ 
tion  rather  than  encouraged  him  to  elusive  enterprises  and  aug¬ 
mented  aggressiveness.  He  did  not  rush  ruthlessly  ahead,  but 
moved  reluctantly  seeking  clearness  and  certainty,  awaiting  the 
divine  direction.  We  have  seen  the  Messianic  ministry  of  Jesus 
and  the  Messianic  attestation ,  which  he  gives  for  himself ,  con¬ 
ditioned  and  controlled  by  a  deep  and  unique  religious  disposi¬ 
tion  (Baldensperger  S.  155).  His  appearance  as  the  Messiah 
was  not  usurpation  but  obedience ,  not  free  choice  but  inexorable 
divine  necessity  (S.  191).  H.  J.  Holtzmann  writes  to  the  point: 
Although  the  Messianic  consciousness  marks  the  greatest  ven¬ 
ture  of  finite  consciousness,  a  fully  sufficient  guarantee  against 
autocratic  superhumanism  is  given  at  least  in  the  unconditional 
subordination  of  the  Messianic  thought  to  the  thought 
of  God  which  towers  over  all  (MBJ,  S.  82).  P.  W.  Schmie- 
del  writes :  In  any  case  it  was  not  out  of  pre¬ 
sumption  that  Jesus  regarded  himself  as  the  Mes¬ 
siah  but  only  after  severe  struggle  (PJSMG,  S.  16)  (1). 

The  self-consciousness  of  the  paranoiac  never  becomes  seri¬ 
ously  problematic  for  himself.  He  accepts  his  deliriant  dignity 
as  the  merest  matter  of  course.  He  may  sink  into  sulky  sullen¬ 
ness  when  his  emotional  exaltations  ebb,  but  when  he  is  in  the 
full  swing  of  his  delirium  the  thought  of  moral  responsibilities 
and  obligations  never  occurs  to  him.  If  its  full  realization  lies 
yet  in  the  future,  he  either  lies  in  wait  for  the  appropriate  op¬ 
portunity  or  attempts  to  force  the  ways  that  will  lead  him  to 
his  coveted  end.  He  feels  that  he  naturally  enjoys  exceptional 
exterritoriality  in  all  the  affairs  and  fields  of  conduct.  He  may 
do  whatsoever  he  will  whenever  and  wherever  he  will.  Whether 
he  feels  it  or  not,  he  acts  as  though  he  were  exempt  even  from 
the  precepts  and  proprieties  of  right  and  wrong.  He  does  not 
see  the  foolishness  and  futility  of  his  harmless  enterprises;  he 
can  commit  a  wrong,  or  even  a  crime,  with  clear  and  undis- 

(1)  We  may  observe  exalted  self-consciousness  and  belief  in  a  definite 
mission  that  verges  on  to  delusional  ideas  in  great  men  who  possess  none 
of  the  features  characteristic  of  psychic  disorders  (Weber,  Sp.  234). 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


223 


turbed  conscience,  and  even  later  retrospection  and  reflection 
sometimes  fail  to  bring  him  to  regret  and  remorse. 

Regular  reserve  and  reticence  such  as  Jesus  practiced  re¬ 
garding  his  identity  is  thoroughly  uncharacteristic  of  the  par¬ 
anoiac.  In  fact  he  has  exactly  the  opposite  inclination.  The 
whole  world  must  know  who  he  is  and  recognize  him  as  such.  He 
must  make  it  clear  to  all  that  he  is  really  not  the  one  he  seems 
or  is  commonly  supposed  to  be ;  he  is  another,  someone  really 
great.  He  may  have  his  periods  of  sullen  silence  brought  on 
by  his  lack  of  success  in  convincing  others,  but  soon  the  old 
delusion  breaks  forth  afresh  and  he  is  again  at  his  old  task  of 
trying  to  convince  others  of  his  unsuspected  dignity.  The  con¬ 
firmed  paranoiac  seldom  has  a  great  cause  for  which  his  person 
is  sacrificed  and  which  he  serves  ;  if  he  has  any  cause  at  all,  it 
figures  only  as  it  contributes  to  the  high  claims  which  he  makes 
for  himself. 

Jesus’  self-consciousness  appears  less  in  the  form  of  a  claim 
and  more  in  the  form  of  a  concession  to  the  divine  will  which  he 
first  confesses  privately  to  his  most  intimate  disciples  and  later 
publicly  before  the  high  priest.  Jesus’  acceptance  of  the  Messi¬ 
anic  title  with  such  modifications  and  reservations  as  he  forced 
upon  it  amounted  practically  to  an  annulment  and  negation 
of  it.  Paul  designated  it  as  a  stumbling-block  to  the  Jew  and 
as  foolishness  to  the  Greek. 

In  closing  our  study  of  the  self-consciousness  of  Jesus  from 
the  pathographic  point  of  view  it  is  well  to  cite  a  word  of  Shir¬ 
ley  Jackson  Case,  which  is  one  of  the  most  significant  utter¬ 
ances  regarding  the  understanding  of  the  problem  of  Jesus’ 
self-consciousness  in  recent  times:  The  messianic  thought  did 
not  master  him;  he  was  its  conqueror ,  not  its  victim ,  and  he  at¬ 
tained  this  position  by  placing  more  stress  upon  his  choice  of 
God  than  upon  God's  choice  of  him  (P.  289). 

In  all  the  features  of  his  self-consciousness  Jesus  forms  the 
clearest  sort  of  contrast  to  all  those  types  of  insanity  in  which 
self-estimation  is  most  extremely  exalted  and  falsely  exagger¬ 
ated. 


EXCURSUS 
The  Affliction  of  Paul 


It  is  not  at  all  surprising  that  Jesus’  pathographers  also 
come  upon  the  question  of  Paul’s  psychic  health.  Frenssen, 
hardly  a  pathographer  of  Jesus,  writes  of  Paul:  He  was  a 
morbid  man  through  and  through.  And  according  to  what  he 
writes  in  many  passages  in  his  letters  to  his  friends ,  his  malady 
was  something  as  follows :  he  was  r ached  by  severe  nervous  and 
psychic  disturbances  which  made  natural  life  appear  to  him  as 
misery,  nausea  and  death;  from  time  to  time  this  condition  was 
aggravated  to  epileptic  attacks  during  which,  in  a  state  of  un¬ 
consciousness,  he  beheld  visions  of  wondrous  heavenly  splendor 
and  magnificence  (S.  90).  Of  Paul’s  experience  on  the  Dam¬ 
ascus  road  Baumann  says :  Today  we  would  doubtless  regard  the 
incident  narrated  as  an  hysterico-epileptic  attack ;  in  II  Cor 
12,10  Paul  manifests  a  constitution  similar  to  that  of  Jesus 
(S.  61).  Rasmussen  naturally  finds  Paul  an  epileptic:  That  he, 
in  spite  of  his  greatness,  was  an  epileptic  psychopath  was  an¬ 
nounced  long  ago  by  specialists  in  psychic  diseases  and  is  incon- 

tr overt  ably  clear  in  the  sources . in  his  own  letters  (S. 

79f). 

Hirsch  devotes  considerable  space  to  Paul  (p.  174-207 ;  Ger. 
S.  179-216)  ;  of  course,  Paul  was  a  paranoiac.  There  cannot  be 
the  slightest  doubt  that  in  Paul  we  have  a  typical  case  of  para¬ 
noia.  In  the  meagre  accounts  which  we  have  of  him,  all  the  symp¬ 
toms  which  go  to  make  up  the  clinical  picture  of  paranoia  are 
characteristically  described.  His  psychical  efficacy  was  dom¬ 
inated  by  delusions  and  hallucinations ,  and  all  his  actions  were 
governed  by  these  psychopathic  processes  (p.  20 8).  Like  Jesus 
Christ,  Paul  was  a  paranoiac,  whose  thoughts  and  acts  all  rest¬ 
ed  on  delusions  and  hallucinations.  His  writings  which  were 
handed  down  to  us,  and  which  laid  the  foundation  stone  of  the 
Christian  religion,  are  in  every  way  characteristic  of  the  in¬ 
sanity  at  the  bottom  of  them  (p.  207). 

Before  the  pathographers  of  Jesus  had  put  in  their  appear¬ 
ance  the  Pauline  research  in  the  field  of  New  Testament  criti¬ 
cism  came  upon  the  question  of  Paul’s  affliction,  particularly  in 

224 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


225 


connection  with  the  nature  of  his  conversion  on  the  Damascus 
road  and  his  confession  of  a  thorn  in  the  flesh  in  II  Cor  12,7ff. 

Some  students  of  Paul  find  in  his  II  Cor  12  confession  only 
a  physical  affliction  that  greatly  hampered  and  hindered  the 
apostle  in  his  missionary  activity  and  as  having  no  connection 
with  his  conversion  or  any  of  his  unusual  experiences.  Dr.  E. 
Preuschen  (Article  entitled  Paulus  als  Antichrist  in  the  Zeit - 
schrift  fuer  die  N.  T.  liche  Wissenschaft ;  Giessen ,  1901)  ar¬ 
gues  that  Paul  was  afflicted  with  leprosy  as  evinced  by  his  seven 
days’  purification  and  sin-offering  (Acts  21,26)  by  which  he 
hoped  to  be  cured  (see  Conybeare,  p.  363).  H.  Weinel  sees  in 
Paul’s  experience  before  Damascus  only  the  culmination  of  a 
series  of  severe  inner  struggles  that  condensed  themselves  at  this 
point  in  a  vision  which  Avas  devoid  of  all  connections  with  any 
physiologic  or  psychic  ailment  (Paulus,  S.  53). 

A.  Diessmann  is  sceptical  about  any  definite  diagnosis  in 
Paul’s  case  because  of  the  scantiness  of  the  materials  in  the 
sources.  Of  II  Cor  12,7ff  he  writes :  We  cannot  determine  to 
what  special  malady  these  symptoms  point.  Various  conject¬ 
ures  have  been  attempted  often ,  but  without  sufficient  certain¬ 
ty:  the  meagre  hints  which  Paul  himself  gives  admonish  caution 
(S.  43).  However,  he  connects  Paul’s  Damascus  experience 
directly  with  his  strong  inclination  toward  exceptional  ecstatic 
moments :  The  Damascus  incident  is  not  to  be  isolated  but  must 
be  regarded  as  the  fundamental  mystic  experience  of  the  relig¬ 
ious  genius  who  in  his  later  life  knew  that  he  was  honored  with 
definite  extraordinary  ecstatic  visitations  (S.  83). 

Otto  Pfleiderer  sees  in  both  II  Cor  12, Iff  and  in  the  conver¬ 
sion  of  Paul  typical  states  of  ecstasy,  toward  AAThich  the  apostle 
was  strongly  predisposed  by  his  excessively  nervous  and  excit¬ 
able  physical  and  psychic  constitution.  Specially  significant  in 
this  connection  is  the  passage  II  Cor  12, Iff  where  the  ecstatic 
state  of  consciousness  during  the  visions,  whose  objectivity  was 
for  Paul  beyond  all  question  of  doubt,  reveals  itself  in  the  notice: 
he  does  not  know  whether  he  is  in  the  body  or  out  of  the  body 
while  he  is  caught  away  into  the  third  heaven.  But  when  in  the 
same  connection  peculiar  bodily  sufferings  and  exhaustions, 
which  were  connected  with  the  exalted  visions,  are  spoken  of, 


226 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


such  points  unmistakably  to  states  of  nervous  convulsion  which 
usually  attend  the  ecstatic  consciousness ,  or  furnish  it  a  physio¬ 
logical  basis.  Hence  we  may  conclude  with  certainty  that  the 
physiologic- psychic  organism  of  Paul  was  in  general  favorably 

disposed  to  such  experiences .  The  psychic  conditions 

which  lay  at  the  base  of  the  Damascus  incident  are  to  be  clear¬ 
ly  recognized  thus  far:  a  nervous  irritable  constitution  which 
was  by  nature  predisposed  to  visionary  states,  a  soul  terribly 
shaken  and  torn  by  painful  doubting  because  it  had  become  un¬ 
certain  regarding  the  rightness  of  its  fanatical  conduct  (S. 

62ff). 

Not  a  few  New  Testament  critics  agree  with  the  diagnosis 
of  Rasmussen  that  Paul  was  an  epileptic  and  that  his  numerous 
visions  and  special  revelations  are  to  be  accounted  for  in  the 
light  of  his  affliction ;  however,  they  disagree  with  Rasmussen 
in  designating  Paul  as  a  psychopath. 

A.  Juelicher:  It  has  been  concluded  with  great  plausibility 

from  II  Cor  12,7-9  that  he  (Paul)  as  a  Christian  convert . 

and  indeed  not  without  connection  with  the  intense  religious  ex¬ 
citement  which  manifested  itself  in  him  in  numerous  “ visions  and 
revelations ” . became  an  epileptic  (Einl.  S.  34). 

F.  C.  Conybeare  also  is  of  the  opinion  that  Paul  was  an 
epileptic.  He  speaks  of  Paul’s  hallucinations  and  transcend¬ 
ental  fancies  (p.  9).  Paul  was  pre-eminently  a  man  of  visions 
and  dreams,  prizing  what  in  moments  of  ecstasy  he  beheld  more 
highly  than  waking  realities  (p.  3).  He  was,  like  many  a  later 
saint,  of  a  temperament  naturally  ecstatic  and  perpetually  saw 
Christ,  and  conversed  with  him  in  visions;  his  words  and  ac¬ 
tions,  even  his  missionary  movements ,  as  he  is  careful  to  inform 
us,  were  inspired  and  directed  not  by  reflection  but  by  revela¬ 
tion  (p.  4).  On  II  Cor  12, Iff  Conybeare  remarks:  The  afflic¬ 
tion  in  question  was  undoubtedly  the  epilepsy  which  often  at¬ 
tends  such  temperaments  (p.  4).  Partial  or  even  complete 
blindness  is  a  frequent  concomitant  of  epilepsy,  and  if  Paul  had 
suffered  therefrom  it  would  explain  another  passage  (the  first 
passage  being  Gal  4,14)  at  the  end  of  the  epistle  to  the  Gala¬ 
tians,  6,11 :  “See  with  what  large  letters  I  have  written  to  you 
with  my  own  hand.”  It  was  certainly  an  effort  to  him  to  use 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


227 


his  own  hand  in  writing,  and  when  he  did  so  he  had  to  write  a 
large  hand.  Elsewhere  he  refers  to  the  use  of  amanuenses. 
These  passages  point  to  a  partial  blindness.  His  visitation  on 
the  way  to  Damascus  was  accompanied  by  temporary  blind¬ 
ness  (p.  363). 

Hans  Lietzmann  finds  that  the  materials  for  a  diagnosis 
of  Paul’s  affliction  in  II  Cor  12,7  are  inadequate  for  a  definite 
diagnosis.  Judged  on  the  basis  of  two  passages,  one  in  Euse¬ 
bius  and  one  in  Hieronymous,  the  buffeting  at  the  hands  of 
Satan’s  messenger  is  hardly  epilepsy,  rather  night-mare.  There 
is  no  necessary  connection  between  the  affliction  referred  to  in 
II  Cor  12,7  and  the  abundance  of  Paul’s  ecstatic  visions.  Lietz- 

two  surely  attested  hallucinations  of  Paul  in 
a  period  of  twenty-two  years.  Gal  4,llf  would  seem  to  indi¬ 
cate  some  sort  of  eye-trouble  as  the  apostle’s  affliction.  Tem¬ 
porary  blindness  and  weak  eyes  are  common  in  cases  of  epil¬ 
epsy  ;  epilepsy  in  the  case  of  Paul  is  not  necessarily  excluded, 
but  nowhere  required.  II  Cor  12,7  seems  to  fit  hysteria  best 
(III,  218ff). 

In  the  first  edition  of  his  work,  Die  hellenistisch-roemische 
Kultur  in  ihren  Beziehungen  zu  Judcntum  und  Christentum , 
P.  Wendland  determined  upon  epilepsy  as  the  malady  of  Paul 
on  the  basis  of  II  Cor  12,7.  But  in  the  second- third  edition 
of  his  work  he  regards  the  epilepsy  hypothesis  as  uncertain  in 
view  of  expert  medical  opinion  to  the  effect  that  the  materials 
in  the  sources  are  too  meagre  for  any  definite  diagnosis  (S. 
218,  Anm.  1). 

This  modification  of  Wendland’s  opinion  was  occasioned 
by  the  pamphlet,  War  Paulus  Epileptiker ?  (Leipzig,  J.  C. 
Heinrichs,  1910,  82  S.)  (1)  by  Dr.  Adolf  Seeligmueller, 

noted  nerve  specialist  in  Halle.  Dr.  Seeligmueller  op¬ 
poses  the  assumption  that  Paul  was  an  epileptic  for  the 
following  reasons:  Paul  manifests  none  of  the  intellec¬ 
tual,  affective  or  volitional  symptoms  of  epilepsy ;  the  his¬ 
torical  data,  such  as  the  thorn  in  the  flesh,  the  visions  and  the 
supposed  eye-trouble,  cannot  be  regarded  as  stigmata  of  that 

(1)  Dr.  Seeligmueller’s  conclusions  were  accessible  to  the  writer  only 
in  Dr.  Weber’s  review  in  the  Theoloaische  Literaturzeituna ,  1911,  Nr.  8, 
Sp.  235-36. 


mann  finds  only 


228 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


disease  in  the  light  of  present-day  scientific  psychiatry ;  that 
any  of  Paul’s  unusual  psychic  experiences  were  epileptic  at¬ 
tacks  is  excluded  by  the  apostle’s  ability  to  recall  them  as  inci¬ 
dents  and  relate  their  contents.  Dr.  Seeligmueller  favors  at¬ 
tacks  of  megrim  or  malaria  as  the  probable  affliction  of  Paul. 

Dr.  Weber  himself  remarks :  That  Paul  was  seriously  af¬ 
flicted  with  epilepsy  is  not  to  he  concluded  from  the  materials 
at  our  disposition.  What  the  nature  of  his  affliction  was,  if 
he  was  afflicted  at  all,  is  not  to  he  determined  with  incontest¬ 
able  certainty  (Sp.  236). 

A.  Hausrath:  It  is  not  to  he  doubted  that  the  visions  of  Paul 
were  connected  with  his  morbid  nervous  constitution.  Whether 
he  had  similar  experiences  before  his  Damascus  vision  he  has  not 
zold  us,  hut  this  vision  seems  to  he  associated  with  an  epileptic 
attach  (I  275). 

G.  Hollmann’s  statement  to  the  effect  that  Paul  was  an  epil- 
eptic  has  been  cited  above  (see  p.  10f). 

Of  II  Cor  12,7ff  W.  Wrede  writes:  Here  a  definite  patholo¬ 
gical  picture  is  presented :  Paul,  like  other  great  men  of  history 
( Caesar  and  Napoleon ),  suffered  with  epileptic  attacks.  This 
is  more  than  mere  conjecture ,  for  the  description  of  the  apostle 
is  verified  by  the  fact  that  visions  are  to  he  observed  frequently 
in  epileptic  victims.  The  blissful  state  of  beholding  sublime 
scenes,  the  disappearance  of  bodily  consciousness,  the  attack 
with  its  convulsions . all  this  is  a  single  pathological  pro¬ 

cess.  Was  such  also  the  case  on  the  way  to  Damascus ?  We 
have  no  reason  to  think  so.  In  any  case  a  quite  special  light  is 
thrown  upon  the  rise  of  this  first  vision  (Paulus,  S.  17).  How¬ 
ever,  Wrede  adds:  The  impression  of  health  is  nevertheless  pre¬ 
dominant  in  the  case  of  Paul  (S.  18). 

W.  Bousset  finds  that  Paul’s  struggle  with  his  handicap  is 
one  of  the  finest  traits  in  his  character.  To  the  passage  II  Cor 
12,5-10  he  gives  the  title,  Die  Krankheit  des  Paulus.  He  re¬ 
gards  this  malady  of  the  apostle  as  chronic  and  as  expressing 
itself  in  single,  but  severe  attacks.  It  was  probably  epilepsy, 
or  some  sort  of  painful  affliction  of  a  rheumatic,  neuralgic,  or 
hysteric  nature.  We  may  conclude  that  the  whole  visionary, 
ecstatic  peculiarity  of  Paul,  such  as  is  manifest  here  and  in 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


229 


other  passages,  had  its  ground-work  for  the  most  part  in  a 
certain  pathological  organization .  Indeed  we  may  perhaps  as¬ 
sume  that  the  visions  and  revelations  of  Paid  stood  in  a  mani¬ 
fold  direct  relation  with  such  morbid  attacks .  We  have 

no  right  to  be  startled  at  these  conclusions.  What  we  admire 
in  Paul  is  precisely  how  he  with  heroic  energy  compelled  into 
service  again  and  again  the  body  that  failed  him  often ,  the 
manner  in  which  he  raised  himself  above  the  distress  and  pain 
of  his  physical  existence  in  unbroken  trust  in  the  power  of  God 
working  through  him  and  in  submissive  self-denial . Ex¬ 

perience  has  taught  repeatedly  that  psychically  highly  gifted 
persons,  instead  of  submitting  to  a  malicious  and  stubborn  sick¬ 
ness  or  other  physical  ailment,  develop  their  splendid  steel-like 
energy  in  struggle  and  resistance  (SdNT,  II  217ff). 

Turning  to  the  sources  themselves,  we  find  that  in  II  Cor 
12,7-9  Paul  confesses  to  some  sort  of  affliction  which  he  regards 
as  a  great  handicap:  And  by  reason  of  the  exceeding  greatness 
of  the  revelations,  that  I  should  not  be  exalted  overmuch ,  there 
was  given  to  me  a  thorn  in  the  flesh,  a  messenger  of  Satan  to 
buffet  me,  that  I  should  not  be  exalted  overmuch.  Concerning 
this  thing  I  besought  the  Lord  thrice,  that  it  might  depart 
from  me.  And  he  hath  said  unto  me,  My  grace  is  sufficient 
for  thee:  for  my  power  is  made  perfect  in  weakness.  Paul  here 
seems  afflicted  with  some  ailment  which  was  chronic  and  which 
had  been  the  theme  of  repeated  prayer  and  petition  for  relief. 
Not  only  Paul  himself  is  aware  of  it,  but  also  the  readers  of  his 
letters;  he  writes  in  Gal  1,13-11,  But  ye  know  that  because  of 
an  infirmity  of  the  flesh  I  preached  the  Gospel  unto  you  the 
first  time,  and  that  which  was  a  temptation  to  you  in  my  flesh 
ye  despised  not,  nor  rejected;  but  ye  received  me  as  an  angel 
of  God,  even  as  Christ  Jesus. 

We  see  that  Paul  speaks  regularly  of  his  infirmity  as  in  the 
flesh,  but  that  by  no  means  would  indicate  it  as  purely  physio¬ 
logical  and  devoid  of  psychic  connections.  That  his  affliction 
did  have  its  psychic  side  is  clear  from  the  fact  that  he  speaks 
of  it  directly  in  connection  with  the  abundance  of  his  visions 
and  revelations  in  II  Cor  12,  1  of  which  he  cites  two  particu¬ 
lar  instances  in  the  three  following  verses:  I  know  a  man  in 


230 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Christ ,  fourteen  years  ago  ( whether  in  the  body,  I  know  not ; 
or  whether  out  of  the  body ,  I  know  not;  God  knoweth ),  such 
a  one  caught  up  even  to  the  third  heaven.  And  I  know  such  a 
man  ( whether  in  the  body,  or  out  of  the  body,  I  know  not;  God 
knoweth ),  how  that  he  was  caught  up  into  Paradise ,  and  heard 
unspeakable  words,  which  it  is  not  lawful  for  a  man  to  utter. 
Here  we  have  doubtless  to  deal  with  experiences  of  a  highly 
ecstatic  character  attended  by  hallucinations  in  both  the  visual 
and  auditory  fields  of  sense  and  with  the  complete  loss  of  bodily 
consciousness. 

Beyond  the  character,  the  frequency  of  Paul’s  elated  and 
extraordinary  experiences  would  show  that  they  were  organ¬ 
ically  connected  with  what  he  calls  his  infirmity  (Acts  9,1-10 ; 
16,9  [=11  Cor  2,12-13];  18,9-10;  22,17-21;  23,11;  27,23; 
Gal  2,2).  Moreover,  Paul  ascribes  great  importance  to  these 
experiences  and  acts  according  to  them  at  important  junctures 
in  his  career.  His  experience  on  the  Damascus  road  includes 
both  visual  and  auditory  hallucinations,  and  it  is  absolutely 
revolutionary  in  his  conduct  and  consciousness  henceforth  as 
a  called  apostle  of  Christ.  He  rehearses  this  experience,  rem¬ 
inisces  upon  it  and  refers  to  it  (Acts  22,6-11;  26,12-19;  I 
Cor  9,1;  15,8;  II  Cor  4,6;  12,1;  Gal  1,16-17;  Eph  3,3;  Phil 
3,12).  It  constitutes  the  credentials  of  his  apostleship. 

Further,  the  indwelling  Christ  of  Christian  experience  was 
for  Paul  a  kind  of  second  self,  or  extra-ego.  It  would  be  un¬ 
just  and  unhistorical  to  overlook  the  mystical  character  of 
Paul’s  thought  and  language  in  such  expressions,  and  to  regard 
them  from  the  purely  psychanalytic  viewpoint.  Nevertheless, 
Paul  regards  his  call  to  Christ  as  a  dissolution  of  his  old  ego 
which  is  replaced  by  a  new  ego  which  he  identifies  with  Christ 
himself. 

The  severe  moral  test,  amounting  almost  to  depreciation, 
to  which  Paul  subjected  certain  unusual  psychic,  supposed 
manifestations  of  the  Spirit  in  the  early  Christian  community 
would  seem  to  suggest  that  he  was  sceptical  regarding  their 
supernatural  origin,  perhaps  on  the  basis  of  what  he  knew 
to  be  the  pathological  origin  of  certain  of  his  own  inner  exper¬ 
iences. 


THE  PERSONALITY  OF  JESUS 


231 


It  is  not  permissible  to  save  the  psychic  health  of  Jesus 
at  the  expense  of  Paul,  but  any  observant  reader  of  the  Synop¬ 
tic  Gospels,  Acts,  and  the  Pauline  epistles  will  find  that  the 
New  Testament  records  concerning  Paul  are  much  richer  and 
more  abundant  in  pathographic  materials  than  are  those  con¬ 
cerning  Jesus.  But  in  spite  of  his  dreams,  trances,  visions,  and 
states  of  ecstasy  the  impression  that  we  get  of  Paul  as  we  read 
of  him  in  the  New  Testament  is  that  he  was  a  man  of  healthy 
heart  and  mind. 


CHAPTER  VI 
The  Pathography  of  Jesus 

1)  The  Possibility  of  a  Diagnosis  in  the  Case  of  Jesus 

No  medical  scientist  is  franker  in  recognizing  and  admit¬ 
ting  the  difficulties,  limitations,  even  provisionalities,  of  any 
diagnosis  he  may  make  than  the  schooled  and  experienced  spec¬ 
ialist  in  mental  diseases.  Here  Ivrafft-Ebing  is  representative: 
Even  in  the  domain  of  physical  disease,  where  exact  physical 
means  for  diagnosis  are  at  hand,  it  is  often  difficult  to  decide 
where  health  changes  to  disease.  How  much  more  difficult 
must  it  he,  then,  in  the  psychic  domain ,  where  a  standard  of 
mental  health  can  only  he  thought  of  as  ideal;  where  no  indivi¬ 
dual  is  exactly  like  another ,  and  emotions,  passionsj  and  varia¬ 
tions  of  feeling,  of  thought,  and  of  will  from  the  majority  of 
mankind,  even  errors  of  the  understanding  and  illusions  of 
sense,  are  possible  within  the  limits  of  physiologic  life,  and  as 
elementary  mental  disturbances,  are  absolutely  compatible  with 
the  existence  of  mental  clearness  and  free  will  (p.  231f). 

The  most  necessary  factor  in  making  a  diagnosis  of  any 
kind  of  disease,  physical  or  psychic,  is,  of  course,  personal 
observation  and  examination.  This  observation  and  examina¬ 
tion  must,  further,  be  long,  painstaking  and  carefully  con¬ 
tinued.  Even  then  the  physiologic  and  psychic  symptoms  may 
be  so  complicated  and  complex  that  the  diagnostician  is  not 
only  not  clear  as  to  what  special  type  of  mental  alienation  he 
has  before  him,  but  often  is  not  sure  whether  his  subject  is 
healthy  or  diseased.  The  healthy  or  diseased  state  is  to  be 
determined  only  by  a  careful  analysis  ^f  the  sensory  stimuli 
to  which  the  subject  is  exposed,  his  response  to  them,  and  the 
issues  in  motor  expression  that  ensue  in  words  and  acts.  In 
absentia  and  post  mortem  examinations  lack  the  most  import¬ 
ant  and  necessary  means  for  a  diagnosis.  A  pathographic 

232 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


233 


study,  then,  must  of  necessity  dispense  with  this  fundamental 
principle  of  observation.  It  is  just  for  this  reason  of  pre¬ 
cluded  observation  that  psychiatrists  in  general  accord  little 
or  no  recognition  to  comparative  psychopathology  and  path- 
ography.  In  fact,  pathographers  have  fallen  into  great  dis¬ 
credit  with  skilled  specialists  in  mental  disease. 

Turning  to  Jesus,  we  find  that  the  possibility  of  observa¬ 
tion,  the  indispensable  prerequisite  of  all  scientific  judgment, 
is  hopelessly  out  of  the  question  in  the  case  of  an  historical 
personage  who  died  on  the  cross  nineteen  centuries  ago.  We 
shall  never  see  Jesus  act  or  hear  him  speak  again  as  a  man  of 
history.  What  he  did  and  said,  how  he  acted  and  spoke  is 
transmitted  to  us  only  in  the  meagre  records  containing  the 
recollections  and  reminiscences  of  a  handful  of  his  disciples 
and  followers. 

The  next  important  factor  in  the  diagnosis  of  a  psychosis 
is  the  knowledge  and  careful  tracing  of  the  course  of  its  de¬ 
velopment.  The  course  of  a  psychosis  Krafft-Ebing  consid¬ 
ers  next  in  importance  to  the  symptoms  themselves  (p.  199). 
Binswanger  writes :  The  diagnosis  of  a  psychic  disorder  can¬ 
not  he  made  with  certainty  from  the  determination  of  a  typical 
state ,  hut  only  from  the  most  exact  knowledge  of  the  process 
of  its  development  and  entire  course  (S.  80).  No  single  symp¬ 
tom  will  suffice,  and  as  large  a  portion  of  the  subject’s  life  as 
possible  must  be  brought  under  consideration.  The  diagnosis 
involves  the  determination  of  the  time  of  the  inception,  the 
causes  back  of  the  inception,  the  delineation  of  the  progress 
of  the  disease  through  the  latent  stages,  its  transition  to  and 
its  course  through  the  active  phase.  As  to  the  duration  of  a 
psychosis,  it  may  last  for  months,  even  years;  acuter  types 
may  reach  the  acme  and  termination  wdthin  a  few  weeks. 

Here  too  pathological  psychanalysis  is  embarrassed  in  the 
case  of  Jesus.  The  sources  furnish  us  no  materials  which  make 
it  possible  to  trace  the  rise  and  development  of  any  psychic 
phenomena  peculiar  to  Jesus.  Keim  was  the  first  to  attempt 
to  trace  the  development  of  Jesus’  self-consciousness,  but 
scholars  since  have  become  increasingly  sceptical  on  this  point. 
The  first  thirty  years  of  Jesus’  life  are  shrouded  in  darkness. 


234 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


He  is  a  mature  man  when  he  appears  at  the  Jordan,  and  the 
Gospels  furnish  us  no  clues  for  the  confirmation  of  any  changes 
or  transitions  in  his  self-consciousness  from  one  psychic  type 
to  another.  Further,  his  public  career  is  too  short;  as  stated 
before,  it  is  to  be  reckoned  in  months,  some  even  in  weeks  (Bur- 
kitt — 400  days),  and  not  in  years.  It  is  only  by  the  employ¬ 
ment  of  the  Fourth  Gospel,  where  Jesus’  public  ministry  ex¬ 
tends  well  into  the  third  year,  that  the  pathographers  can  trace 
a  developmental  psychosis.  Then  the  Fourth  Gospel  becomes 
the  biography  of  the  decline  (Binet-Sangle).  The  very  brevity 
of  Jesus’  public  career  forces  his  pathographers  (de  Loosten, 
Hirsch,  Binet-Sangle)  to  locate  the  transition  from  the  latent 
to  the  active  stage  at  the  Jordan  or  in  the  desert  as  the  pro¬ 
moting  cause  of  his  public  appearance  in  Galilee.  During  his 
public  career,  of  which  alone  we  have  record,  we  find  that  Jesus 
is  and  remains  one  and  the  same  character  and  person. 

The  necessary  steps  to  be  taken  in  the  diagnosis  of  a  psy¬ 
chosis  are  to  be  found  elaborately  outlined  in  any  textbook 
on  insanity  (see  Binswanger,  S.  78f ;  Kraepelin,  p.  97ff ; 
Krafft-Ebing,  p.  240ff).  They  are  most  succinctly  summar¬ 
ized  by  Kraepelin  as  follows:  a)  anamnesis  of  family,  b)  per¬ 
sonal  history  previous  to  disease,  c)  anamnesis  of  the  disease, 
d)  status  praesens.  This  bare  outline  suffices  to  show  that  the 
available  materials  for  a  diagnosis  in  the  case  of  Jesus  are  so 
meagre  as  to  make  a  diagnosis  next  to  impossible,  unless  the 
most  pronounced  and  characteristic  pathological  symptoms  are 
discovered  in  the  sources.  We  therefore  proceed  to  look  into 
the  heredity  of  Jesus  and  to  sift  the  sources  for  any  somatic 
or  psychic  symptoms. 

2)  Heredity 

Since  60-70%  (Binswanger)  of  the  inmates  of  institu¬ 
tions  for  the  insane  suffer  under  some  hereditary  burden,  it  is 
not  at  all  surprising  that  Jesus’  pathographers  have  endeav¬ 
ored  to  exploit  this  fertile  field  (1).  Soury  was  the  first;  he 

(1)  By  far  the  most  important  cause  of  insanity  is  the  transmissibility 
of  psychopathic  dispositions  or  cerebral  infirmities  by  way  of  heredity; 
Krafft-Ebing,  p.  157.  Clinical  observation  also  finds  that  in  point  of 
Rationality  insanity  is  most  frequent  among  the  Jews. 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


235 


accounted  for  the  cerebral  paralysis  with  which  Jesus  suffered 
by  the  assumption  of  an  hereditary  burden  which  manifested 
itself  in  another  member  of  Jesus’  family,  his  brother  James 
(see  above  p.  21f).  De  Loosten  found  evidences  of  a 
collateral  and  direct  hereditary  influence  through  the  ma- 
ternal  side  of  the  family;  John  the  Baptist  was  a  psy¬ 
chopath,  perhaps  also  James,  the  brother  of  Jesus.  Binet- 
Sangle  reckons  with  a  converging  and  cumulative  hereditary 
burden  which,  coming  chiefly  from  the  paternal  side  of  the  fam¬ 
ily,  resulted  in  the  extinction  of  Joseph’s  family  within  four 
generations. 

On  turning  to  the  New  Testament  sources  in  search  of 
materials  concerning  the  health  history  of  Jesus’  family,  we 
find  that  Jesus’  father  never  figures  personally  in  Jesus’  pub¬ 
lic  career.  Joseph  is  referred  to  by  name  in  Lc  1,22  (3,23), 
by  occupation  in  Mt  13,55,  but  by  neither  in  Me.  (Me  6,3 
reads  6  ton  textovog  vio?  in  13  69  33  597 .  .  .  .  a  b  c  e  i  aur  aeth ; 
Huck,  S.  83.)  The  general  supposition  is  that  Joseph  died 
long  before  Jesus’  public  appearance,  for  Mary  seems  to  be 
known  in  Nazareth  as  a  widow  (Me  3,31=Mt  12,1 6=Lc  8,19). 
Joseph  figures  personally  only  in  the  narratives  of  the  nativity 
in  the  first  and  third  Gospels ;  in  Lc  he  plays  a  purely  minor 
role,  but  in  Mt’s  birth  stories  he  is  very  prominent.  Here  he 
appears  more  after  the  manner  of  an  Old  Testament  patriarch 
to  whom  God  reveals  himself  by  angels  in  dreams  (l,20ff ; 
2,13ff ;  2,19;  2,22). 

Jesus’  mother,  however,  does  appear  personally  in  the 
course  of  his  public  career  in  Me  3,31  and  she  is  mentioned  by 
name  in  6,3.  In  Lc’s  narrative  of  the  nativity  she  plays  the 
leading  role  and  is  the  recipient  of  a  special  revelation  in  a 
state  of  waking  in  1,2 6ff.  In  the  Synoptics  Jesus’  mother  and 
brethren  are  not  represented  as  at  all  sympathetic  with  his 
appearance  in  public  (Me  3,21).  Binet-Sangle’s  picture  of 
Mary  is  taken  from  the  Fourth  Gospel,  especially  from  the 
Cana  incident  and  the  scene  at  the  cross. 

If  we  turn  to  the  rest  of  the  family  of  Joseph  and  Mary, 
we  find  a  list  of  four  brothers  named  in  Me  6,3  (=Mt  13 ,55f) 
and  unnamed  sisters.  From  among  these  four  brothers  of  Jesus 


236 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


James  has  been  singled  out  as  the  other  psychopath  of  the 
family,  doubtless  for  the  reason  that  we  hear  of  him  more  fre¬ 
quently  in  the  New  Testament.  We  know  that  he  joined  the 
early  Christian  community  in  Jerusalem  at  an  early  date  in 
consequence  of  a  resurrection  vision,  I  Cor  15,7.  He  was 
known  to  Paul  and  the  author  of  Acts  as  one  of  the  leading 
figures  in  the  primitive  Christian  community  at  Jerusalem 
(Gal  1,19;  2,9  12;  Acts  15,13ff;  21,18).  According  to  these 
authors  James  seems  to  have  been  a  conservative  character  yet 
capable  of  considerable  liberality  as  is  clear  from  his  address 
in  Acts  15,13-21  and  the  letter  of  the  Jerusalem  apostles  and 
elders  to  the  Gentile  converts  of  Paul  and  Barnabas  which 
seems  to  have  been  the  work  of  James  (Acts  15,23-29).  The 
New  Testament  furnishes  us  no  reasons  for  concluding  thai 
James,  the  brother  of  Jesus,  was  a  psychopath. 

Concerning  the  Baptist,  whom  ecclesiastical  tradition  has 
regarded  as  a  first  cousin  of  Jesus,  we  are  much  more  fully 
informed.  For  our  New  Testament  information  concerning 
the  Baptist  we  are  chiefly  indebted  to  the  document  Q.  As  it 
is  preserved  in  Mt  and  Lc  we  learn  considerable  about  the  sin¬ 
ister  character  of  the  Baptist’s  message  as  well  as  its  con¬ 
tent  (Mt  3,7-1 0)=Lc  3,7-9,  his  impression  upon  his  contem¬ 
poraries  and  Jesus’  own  high  estimate  and  appreciation  of  him 
(Mt  11,7-19;  21,32 — Lc  7,21-35).  Adding  to  Q  Me  and  Acts, 
as  well  as  special  notices  of  Lc  in  his  Gospel,  we  learn  more 
of  the  Baptist’s  ascetic  and  eccentric  habits  of  life,  (Mt  3,4 
— Me  1,6),  the  organized  and  specially  instructed  character  of 
his  following  (Me  2,18;  Lc  11,1;  Acts  18,25;  19,3),  and 
Herod’s  fear  of  him  and  the  Baptist’s  death  at  his  hands  (Me 
6,14ff ;  Mt  14, Iff ;  Lc  9,7ff).  (Compare  Josephus’  account 
of  the  Baptist’s  death  in  his  Antiquities,  XVIII,  5,  2). 

The  Baptist  figured  prominently  in  Jesus’  public  career; 
he  announced  the  Messiah,  baptized  Jesus,  sent  a  deputation 
to  him,  and  his  message  fits  organically  into  that  of  Jesus.  Mt 
4,17  represents  Jesus  as  repeating  verbatim  the  message  of 
John  in  3,2  and  in  10,7  he  recommends  it  word  for  word  to 
his  disciples  as  they  go  out  on  their  mission.  In  the  eyes  of 
the  public  John  was  a  prophet,  but  like  Jesus  he  must  hear 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


237 


from  the  religious  authorities  the  charge  of  insanity;  in  his 
address  on  the  Baptist  Jesus  cites  a  contemporary  judgment 
upon  the  Baptist  to  the  effect  that  he  hath  a  demon  (Mt  11,18 
=Lc  7,33). 

We  know  too  little  of  the  Baptist  to  make  a  discussion  of 
his  psychic  soundness  worth  while.  That  the  religious  leaders 
should  pronounce  him  insane  is  only  natural  in  view  of  the 
Baptist’s  attitude  toward  them.  But  that  their  judgment  was 
correct  is  not  at  all  to  be  demonstrated.  The  picture  that  we 
gather  of  him,  especially  from  Q,  is  that  the  Baptist  was  a  de¬ 
cidedly  capable  character,  an  impressive  and  forceful  person¬ 
ality,  and  a  great  prophet  and  preacher  with  a  message  and 
mission  of  his  own.  The  picture  of  the  Baptist  in  Me,  where 
he  is  merely  the  forerunner  or  advance  agent  of  the  Messiah, 
and  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  where  he  is  deliberately  subordinated 
and  reduced  to  a  mere  foil  of  Jesus,  is  purely  the  early  Chris¬ 
tian  view  of  the  Baptist  and  the  function  of  his  person  and 
appearance,  and  does  him  great  historical  injustice.  In  this 
respect  Jesus’  own  view  of  the  Baptist  is  less  Christian  than 
that  of  Me  and  Jn. 

The  Baptist’s  ascetic  and  eccentric  habits  of  life  do  not  in 
the  least  compromise  his  psychic  soundness.  His  demands  up¬ 
on  the  various  classes  of  his  contemporaries  who  respond  to 
his  message  are  serious,  sane,,  and  very  practical  (Lc  3,10-11). 
The  very  restrictions  and  reservations  which  he  sets  upon  his 
own  person  and  work  are  not  only  rare  in  cases  of  mental  mor¬ 
bidity,  but  show  us  that  we  have  a  really  great  man  before  us. 

That  Jesus  and  John  were  related  by  blood  is  based  solely 
upon  Lc  1,36  where  the  angel  in  his  announcement  to  Mary 
refers  to  Elizabeth,  the  mother  of  John,  as  her  kinswoman 
(ouyy8v^)*  From  the  point  of  view  of  heredity  it  is  very 
important  to  know  the  degree  of  the  kinship.  The  term 
cruYYev^  does  not  tell  us  whether  this  relationship  was  imme¬ 
diate  or  distant  family  relationship,  or  merely  tribal  (1). 
Even  granting  an  immediate  blood  kinship,  collateral  hered¬ 
itary  influence  is  still  more  improbable  than  probable. 

(1)  Werner  assumes  that  it  was  a  remote  family  relationship  on  the 
basis  of  Jn  1,31. 


238 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Summing  up  the  New  Testament  evidence  on  the  health 
history  of  Jesus’  family,  we  can  say  that  there  are  no  collat¬ 
eral,  direct,  or  converging  lines  that  would  lead  to  the  assump¬ 
tion  of  an  hereditary  burden.  The  only  possible  materials  to 
be  gleaned  are  psychanalytically  worthless.  They  are,  for  the 
most  part,  (the  psychic  experiences  of  Joseph  and  Mary  and 
the  latter’s  kinship  with  the  mother  of  the  Baptist)  historically 
unreliable  and  legendary. 

A  word  concerning  the  role  that  heredity  plays  in  the  trans¬ 
mission  of  a  nervous  constitution  fertile  to  the  appearance  of 
a  psychosis,  or  insanity  itself,  as  expressed  by  expert  medical 
opinion  may  be  added.  Binswanger  reminds  his  readers  that 
the  significance  of  heredity,  in  spite  of  its  importance,  has  been 
greatly  overestimated  (S.  55).  Insanity  in  the  mother  is  more 
dangerous  to  descendants  than  insanity  in  the  father;  if  only 
the  father  or  the  mother  is  tainted ,  then  the  question  depends 
essentially  upon  which  parent  the  individual  psychically  resem¬ 
bles  (Krafft-Ebing,  p.  228f).  In  families  which  are  burdened 
by  heredity  either  on  the  paternal  or  maternal  side ,  the  major¬ 
ity  of  the  descendants ,  reckoned  through  several  generations , 
are  psychically  sound.  However ,  in  heavily  burdened  families , 
particularly  where  the  hereditary  burden  is  converging  and 
cumulative ,  the  number  of  the  psychically  and  nervously  mor¬ 
bid  individuals  later  on  is  notably  larger  (Binswanger,  S.  55). 
Hereditary  burden  gains  a  decisive  influence  in  the  formation 

of  a  psychosis  only  when  it  is  degenerative  in  character . 

Hereditary  degeneration  does  not  create  its  own  peculiar  forms 
of  psychic  morbidity ,  but  gives  to  those  forms  already  present 
a  special  stamp  by  the  alteration  of  the  process  of  develop¬ 
ment ,  by  the  grouping  of  symptoms  and  by  the  termination 
(S.  59).  We  may  add  the  further  limitation  that  from  the 
proof  of  an  hereditary  burden  it  may  by  no  means  be  concluded 
that  the  individual  in  question  must  sooner  or  later  fall 
psychically  ill  (S.  61). 

One  is  not  justified  in  assuming  a  degeneration  even  as 
probable  solely  from  hereditary  burden;  for  this  is  demanded 
the  demonstration  of  signs  of  psychic  degeneration  in  the  irr 
dividual  himself  (Weber,  Sp.  234). 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


239 


3)  Somatic  Symptoms 

A  thorough  physical  examination  is  indispensable  in  the 
case  of  both  plrysiologic  and  psychic  diagnosis.  Somatic 
symptoms  and  deviating  physiological  details  and  formations 
are  of  great  importance. 

In  no  single  item  do  the  Gospels  furnish  us  less  information 
about  Jesus  than  in  physiological  details  and  descriptions.  Of 
Jesus’  outward  appearance  we  know  nothing.  Whether  he 
was  tall,  short,  or  of  medium  stature  we  cannot  say.  That  he 
was  short  of  stature  because  Zacchaeus  had  to  climb  a  tree  in 
order  to  see  him,  or  because  he  rode  into  Jerusalem  on  the  colt 
of  an  ass  is  a  conclusion  drawn  from  the  biographer’s  imagina¬ 
tion.  Jesus’  mien,  mannerisms,  postures,  carriage,  facial  ex¬ 
pression,  etc.,  the  Gospel  writers  left  unfortunately  to  the  art¬ 
ist’s  imagination  (see  G.  S.  Hall,  I.  Chapter  I).  His  habit 
of  association  with  the  social  outcasts,  the  publicans  and  sin¬ 
ners,  was  unconventional  for  the  religious  leaders ;  otherwise 
his  habits  of  life  and  dress  were  not  so  striking  and  eccentric 
as  to  attract  special  attention  and  come  down  to  written  record 
as  did  those  of  the  Baptist. 

The  physiological  details  in  the  Gospels  are  limited  to  the 
following  indications:  He  stretched  forth  his  hand  (Me  1,41)  ; 
laid  his  hands  on  the  children  or  took  them  in  his  arms  (Me 
10,16)  ;  put  his  fingers  in  the  deaf  man’s  ear  and  touched  his 
speechless  tongue  (Mt  7,33)  ;  he  opened  his  mouth  (Mt  5,2) 
or  lifted  up  his  eyes  (Lc  6,20)  ;  his  face  did  shine  as  the  sun 
(Mt  17,2=Lc  9,29)  ;  he  fell  asleep  (Me  4,38)  ;  he  hungered 
(Me  11,12)  ;  etc.  In  the  tomh  of  silence  was  laid  the  body  of 
Jesus ,  and  only  the  angel  of  imagination  can  roll  away  the 
stone  that  shut  from  mortal  sight  the  image  of  the  man  (Wash¬ 
burn,  p.  7). 

The  Gospel  writers,  further,  tell  us  nothing  of  the  physical 
health  of  Jesus  ;  whether  he  w^as  strong  and  well,  or  of  a  more 
delicate  constitution  as  traditional  art  was  fond  of  portraying 
him,  we  do  not  know.  Binet-Sangle  speaks  of  Jesus’  inability 
to  carry  his  own  cross  as  a  sign  of  his  bodily  weakness.  But 
the  Gospels  tell  us  nothing  of  an  inability  of  Jesus  to  carry 


240 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


his  own  cross  (Me  15,21=Mt  27,32=Lc  23,26)  ;  that  Simon 
the  Cyrene  was  pressed  into  service  seems  rather  a  wanton  cap¬ 
rice  of  the  Roman  ^oldiers  who  seem  to  have  found  a  consider¬ 
able  amount  of  jest  in  the  trial  and  execution  of  a  Jewish  peas¬ 
ant  king.  Jesus’  surprisingly  quick  death  on  the  cross  can 
furnish  no  medical  material,  as  de  Loosten  imagines.  The 
spear  thrust  and  the  issue  of  water  and  blood,  of  which  Binet- 
Sangle  makes  so  much,  has  only  a  Johannine  literary  basis, 
and  is  rather  to  be  regarded  as  a  later  Christian  legend  typify¬ 
ing  the  two  great  Christian  symbols.  The  Synoptics  would 
hardly  have  been  unanimous  in  neglecting  such  an  incident  in 
the  crucifixion  scene.  If  historical,  it  is  medically  worthless. 

4)  Psychic  Symptoms 

The  Synoptic  sources  are  rich  in  psychic  phenomena  as 
compared  with  their  complete  lack  of  somatic  details  and  de¬ 
scriptions.  The  emotions  that  attended  a  word  or  act  of  Jesus 
are  not  infrequently  referred  to;  we  have  his  words  and  teach¬ 
ing  by  which  we  can  gauge  to  a  considerable  extent  his  intel¬ 
lectual  capacity  and  capabilities ;  his  acts  and  decisions  fur¬ 
nish  us  a  fair  clue  to  the  soundness  of  his  volitional  powers. 
But  before  going  into  a  study  of  the  psychic  phenomena  that 
are  to  be  sifted  from  the  sources,  it  is  necessary  to  say  a  word 
regarding  standards  of  psychic  normality. 

The  standard  of  psychic  normality  naturally  varies  with 
the  stage  of  civilization  and  culture,  nationality,  milieu,  age, 
sex,  profession  or  occupation,  degree  of  education,  etc.  With 
variance  of  these  items,  what  is  normal  for  one  may  be  abnor¬ 
mal  for  the  other.  In  this  connection  Moses  writes :  We  con¬ 
sider  normal  what  was  considered  such  hy  the  race  and  age 
which  gave  it  birth ,  so  long  as  their  beliefs  did  not  lead  to 
; practices  detrimental  to  the  physical  and  psychical  health  of 
the  people  who  entertained  them.  It  is  unfair  and  unscientific 
to  arbitrarily  assume  any  age  or  religion  as  a  standard  by 
which  to  measure  all  other  ages  and  religions  (p.  177). 

Coming  down  to  the  individual,  we  find  that  no  two  are  phys¬ 
ically  or  psychically  exactly  alike.  The  world  is  not  popu- 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


Ml 


lated  and  inhabited  by  types,  but  by  individuals,  each  with  his 
own  physical  and  psychical  features  and  peculiarities  which 
constitute  him  as  an  individual  over  against  his  fellow 
members  of  the  human  race.  Types  are  intellectual  abstrac¬ 
tions  and  ideal  creations  from  which  each  concrete  individual 
varies  in  some  or  in  several  respects.  None  of  us  are  free  from 
certain  deviations  from  the  type.  Within  the  limits  of  physical 
and  psychic  health  these  deviations  are  called  features  of  iden¬ 
tity,  personal  peculiarities  and  eccentricities ;  outside  of  these 
limits  they  constitute  our  infirmities,  and  it  is  highly  doubtful 
if  any  person  is  entirely  free  from  some  of  them. 

Ribot  writes :  Leaving  apart  characters  that  are  perfectly 
consistent,  ( in  the  rigorous  sense  of  the  word  they  do  not  exist), 
there  are  in  every  one  of  us  tendencies  of  all  sorts,  all  kinds 
of  possible  contradictions,  all  kinds  of  intermediate  shades,  and 
among  these  tendencies  all  possible  combinations  (DP,  p.  68)  ; 
. The  ego  of  all  of  us  is  made  up  of  contradictory  ten¬ 
dencies  :  virtues  and  vices,  modesty  and  pride,  avarice  and  pro¬ 
digality,  desire  for  rest  and  craving  for  action,  and  of  a  host 
of  others  (p.  60).  In  normal  persons  these  opposite  tendencies 
are  balanced  and  counterpoised ;  in  abnormal  persons  there  is 
no  possibility  of  equilibrium. 

Binet-Sangle's  understanding  of  normality  is  too  indefinite 
and  loose :  The  normal  constitution,  the  constitution  that  is 
healthy  and  rational,  is  the  physiologic  and  mental  condition 
of  the  greatest  number  of  men.  Vices  of  constitution,  disease 
and  insanity,  are  deviations  from  this  normal  type  (IV  334). 

Dr.  Moerchen’s  distinction  and  definition  of  normal,  abnor¬ 
mal,  and  morbid  states  of  soul  is  sufficiently  scientific.  He 
writes :  The  psychic  individuality  comprises  normally 

the  totality  of  the  elementary  psychic  functions  at  every  in¬ 
stant,  and  we  can  first  of  all  theoretically  accept  as  normal  that 
state  of  sold  in  which  the  various  elements  of  the  psychic  pro¬ 
cesses  subsist  in  a  mediating  relationship  to  and  with  one  an¬ 
other.  Abnormal  states  appear  when  the  individual  ele¬ 
mentary  functions  have  suffered  either  a  qualitative  or  a  quan¬ 
titative  modification,  specially  the  latter,  when  they  come  into 


242 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


such  a  relationship  one  to  the  other  that  one  elementary  func¬ 
tion  predominates  in  a  striking  way  to  the  disadvantage  of  the 
others.  But  even  then  in  and  of  itself  the  substance  of  the  no¬ 
tion  of  the  morbid  is  not  yet  realized.  With  this  there 
appears  in  the  psychic  processes  something  new ,  a  modification 
not  of  a  relative  but  of  an  absolute,  positive  kind  (PH,  S.  10  (1). 

Empiric  psychology  recognizes  mind  only  as  a  unit  in  which 
the  various  faculties  present  only  aspects  of  psychic  activity 
which  are  specially  prominent  (Krafft-Ebing,  p.  48).  Although 
the  older  faculty-psychology  has  been  surrendered,  we  never¬ 
theless,  for  the  sake  of  convenience  of  treatment  as  is  still  usual 
in  textbooks  on  both  normal  and  abnormal  psychology,  pro¬ 
ceed  to  study  the  emotions,  the  intellect,  and  the  will  of  Jesus. 

A)  The  Emotions  of  Jesus 

In  cases  of  mental  alienation,  almost  without  exception,  it 
is  the  emotions  that  are  attacked  first  and  affected.  The  first 
psychic  symptoms  take  on  the  form  of  affective  disturbances, 
anomalous  feelings  and  states  of  altered  emotional  excitability 
(Krafft-Ebing,  p.  200). 

Emotions  may  be  morbid  in  their  nature,  or  form,  or  in 
both.  Differentiation  of  normal  from  abnormal  emotions  is 
often  very  difficult.  Even  in  health  personal  emotional  pecu¬ 
liarities  often  closely  resemble  anomalous  affective  states.  The 
normally  depressed  person  may  have  the  same  feelings  as  the 
chronic  melancholiac. 

Psyclianalysis  looks  first  to  the  causes  of  emotions  and  the 
conditions  of  affective  impressionability.  Emotions  are  ano- 
molous  and  morbid  when  adequate  external  causes  are  wanting. 
Emotional  impressionability  may  rise  high  above  or  fall  far  be¬ 
low  the  normal  level.  The  threshold  of  excitability  may  lie 
deeper  than  is  usual  in  health ;  this  state  is  called  hyperesthesia. 
Here  the  emotional  reaction  occurs  with  abnormal  ease  (Krafft- 
Ebing,  p.  51).  The  subject’s  emotions  become  the  prey  of 
momentary  conditions.  The  slightest  excitation  results  in  vio- 

(1)  For  Dr.  Moerchen’s  elaboration  of  his  own  definition  see  his  article 
listed  “MKP”  in  the  attached  bibliography,  S.  424f. 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


243 

lent  emotional  outbreaks  with  a  strong  inclination  to  motor 
discharge.  These  emotional  states  are  highly  unstable,  shallow, 
and  superficial.  Silly  things  are  taken  seriously,  and  serious 
things  are  not  able  to  claim  the  attention.  The  subject  is  peev¬ 
ish  and  capricious.  He  may  be  morbidly  frivolous  (hyperthy- 
mia),  or  morbidly  depressed  (dysthemia),  if  a  crass  disparity 
exists  between  the  affective  impulses  and  the  gravity ,  that  is , 
the  duration  of  the  affective  depression  (Binswanger,  S.  45). 
If  the  threshold  of  emotional  excitability  is  set  abnormally  high, 
we  have  the  condition  designated  as  anesthesia  which  is  char¬ 
acterized  by  a  complete  lack  of  emotioned  reaction  or  its  dimi¬ 
nution  in  the  presence  of  adequate  impressions  (Krafft-Ebing, 
p.  53).  The  subject  is  in  a  state  of  apathy  in  which  the  usual, 
even  the  strongest,  stimulations  call  forth  no  emotional  re¬ 
sponse. 

The  emotions  may  present  anomalies  in  intensity  and  per¬ 
sistence  and  require  an  unusually  long  time  in  subsiding . 

An  emotional  state  seems  abnormally  intense  when  the  affected 
individual  loses  consciousness  and  his  motor  acts  lose  the  char¬ 
acteristics  of  voluntary  acts  (Krafft-Ebing,  p.  212).  Such 
affects  defy  all  attempts  at  control.  Moral  checks  are  often 
absent.  The  subject  loses  all  feeling  for  the  higher  claims  of 
propriety ,  morality  and  religion  (Kraepelin,  p.  63).  The 
higher  ethic  and  esthetic  sentiments  are  displaced  by  the  lower 
sensuous  feelings.  The  subject  is  selfish,  overestimates  himself, 
and  is  unsympathetic  for  the  welfare  and  feelings  of  others. 
Here  we  have  a  complete  perversion  of  the  emotions. 

Turning  to  the  sources  of  our  knowledge  concerning  Jesus 
we  find  that  many  of  the  above  questions  in  which  psychanaly- 
sis  is  interested  cannot  be  answered.  However,  the  emotions 
which  attended  certain  of  Jesus’  words  and  acts  are  not  infre¬ 
quently  given.  Other  words  and  acts  of  Jesus  by  their  very 
nature  and  character  necessarily  indicate  the  tone  in  which 
they  were  spoken  and  the  emotional  state  in  which  they 
done. 


were 


244 


THE,  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Mt 

1)  . 

2)  (8,3  omits) 


3)  (8,3-4  omits) 

4)  8,10  mai'velled 

5)  . 

6)  9,30  strictly 
charged 

8Ve6qi[XT|'0t] 

7)  9,36  compassion 

8)  11,20  upbraid 

9)  (12,12-13  omits) 

10)  12,16  charged 

11)  (13,58  omits) 

12)  14,14  compassion 

13)  . 

14)  15,32  compassion 

15)  (16,2  omits) 

16)  (16,23  omits) 

17)  17,17  (impatience) 

18)  (18,2  omits) 

19)  . 

20)  (11,25  omits) 

21)  (19,14  omits) 

22)  (19,14-15  omits) 

23)  (19,20-21  omits) 

24)  20,34  compassion 

25)  23,37-39  (disap¬ 
pointment) 

26)  . 

27)  26.37-38  sorrow- 
fill,  sore 
troubled,  ex¬ 
ceeding  sorrow¬ 
ful. 

28)  . 

29)  27,46  (distress) 


Me 

1,25  rebuked 

1,41  compassion 
(D  a  ff2  r  syd  i  read 

OQyiff'O’slg  —  an¬ 
ger) 

1,43  sternly  charged 

e|i6gioi](7duevo; 


(6,34)  compassion 


3.5  anger  and 
grieved 

3.12  charged 
much 

6.6  marvelled 

6.34  compassion 

7.34  sighed 
8,2  compassion 

8.12  sighed  deeply 
8,33  rebuke 

9,19  (impatience) 
9,36  (affection) 


10,14  indignation 
10,16  (affection) 
10,21  loved  him 
(10,52  omits) 


14,33-34  greatly 
amazed ,  sore 
troubled,  ex¬ 
ceeding  sorrow¬ 
ful. 


15,34  (distress) 


Lc 

4,35  rebuked 
(5,13  omits) 


5,14  charged 

jtaQTiYYsdsv 

7,9  marvelled 

7,13  compassion 


(10,13  omits) 

(  6,10  omits) 

4,41  rebuked 


9,11  welcomed 


(11,29;  12,54  omit) 


9,41  (impatience) 
(9,47  omits) 

9,55  rebuke 
10,21  rejoiced 
(18,16  omits) 

(18,17  omits) 

(18,22  omits) 

(18,42  omits) 

13,34b  (disap¬ 
pointment) 

22,15  desire 
(22,40  o  ) 

(  m  ) 

(  i  ) 

(  t  ) 

(  s  ) 

23,34  43  (compassion) 


The  above  catalogue,  which  is  not  wholly  exhaustive  yet 
thoroughly  representative,  makes  it  clear  that  Me  is  the  Syn¬ 
optic  psychologist,  for  he  shows  the  greatest  interest  in  the 
emotional  attendants  of  Jesus’  words  and  actions.  He  allows 
Jesus  to  act  and  speak  in  the  greatest  variety  of  natural  emo¬ 
tions.  Many  of  these  temperamental  details,  in  which  Me  is 
richest,  Mt  and  Lc  agree  in  suppressing  or  modifying  (3). 
They  are  specially  careful  to  eliminate  those  features  of  Me 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


245 


which  represent  Jesus  as  speaking  and  acting  under  the  im¬ 
pulse  of  the  sterner  and  stronger  (3,  9,  21)  as  well  as  the  too 
affectionate  (18,  22,  23)  emotions.  Lc  is  more  radical  in  his 
eliminations  and  modifications  than  Mt  (6)  ;  he  even  strips  the 
emotions  from  Jesus’  states  of  soul  in  Gethsemane  (27),  and 
displaces  the  words  of  distress  on  the  cross  with  words  of  com¬ 
passion,  forgiveness,  and  love  (28,  29).  This  suppression 
of  temperamental  affects  by  Mt  and  Lc  in  their  reproduction 
of  Me  belongs  to  the  theology  of  the  Gospels  (compare  Well- 
hausen,  Einl.,  S.  51f ;  Carpenter,  p.  212ff ;  Sir  John  Hawkins, 
p.  117ff). 

The  Synoptists  tell  us  that  Jesus  went,  went  about,  up,  up 
to,  up  into,  on,  through;  journeyed;  came,  came  down,  into, 
nigh ;  drew  near ;  entered  into  a  city,  village,  boat,  house,  syna¬ 
gogue,  the  temple ;  left,  departed,  withdrew ;  walked  by,  upon, 
on,  in ;  passed  by,  along ;  stood,  stood  still,  over,  by ;  sat,  sat 
down,  by,  thereon,  at  meat ;  arose,  turned,  turned  about ; 
brought  out,  let  go,  took  with;  gave  thanks,  blessed,  brake, 
gave;  opened,  read,  closed;  lodged,  dwelt;  fell  asleep,  awoke; 
taught,  preached,  healed  ;  showed  ;  called,  called  unto,  welcomed ; 
sent,  sent  out,  away,  forth ;  appointed,  gave  authority ;  suf¬ 
fered,  suffered  not,  put  forth;  said,  told,  spoke  in  parables, 
asked,  was  told,  answered,  finished,  ended  (sayings)  ;  held  his 
peace,  put  to  silence;  charged,  charged  strictly,  sternly,  con¬ 
strained,  commanded;  rebuked,  upbraided,  cursed  (fig  tree); 
cast  out,  overthrew;  was  tempted,  fell  on  his  face,  kneeled  down, 
prayed,  wept ;  looked  up,  around,  about,  saw,  beheld ;  heard ; 
perceived,  knew ;  touched,  took  hold,  raised  up ;  fasted,  ate, 
hungered,  tasted,  drank ;  cried  with  a  loud  voice  and  yielded 
up  the  spirit. 

Such  is  the  extent  and  simplicity  of  the  vocabulary  of  the 
Synoptists  in  their  narrations  of  Jesus’  words  and  deeds.  The 
tone  of  his  words  and  the  manner  of  his  actions  with  the  at¬ 
tending  emotions  are  only  meagrely  given  to  us.  We  know 
that  he  felt  compassion  and  love  for  his  people  and  for  the 
afflicted  who  presented  themselves  to  him  for  cure,  that  he  wel¬ 
comed  the  multitudes  on  one  occasion,  rejoiced  at  the  return 
and  report  of  his  disciples,  and  felt  affection  for  little  children 


246 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


and  loved  the  rich  young  ruler.  We  know  that  he  marvelled, 
sighed  deeply,  was  angry,  grieved,  impatient,  indignant  and 
disappointed ;  that  he  desired  with  great  desire,  was  exceed¬ 
ingly  sorrowful,  greatly  amazed,  sore  troubled,  in  distress  and 
despair.  Weidel  writes  in  his  characteristic  way:  The  variety 
of  his  moods  is  astonishing :  he  could  tell  a  story  vividly ,  stir¬ 
ringly  rouse,  pulverizingly  punish,  gently  comfort ,  shame  with 
biting  scorn,  bitterly  rebuke,  be  violently  angry,  and  enthusir 
astically  rejoice  (S.  72). 

There  is  nothing  pathological  in  the  nature  of  Jesus’  emo¬ 
tions.  Every  healthy  person  has  felt  all  the  emotions  which 
the  Synoptics  ascribe  to  him.  Nor  is  there  anything  morbid 
in  the  causes  or  occasions  of  Jesus’  emotions;  all  are  adequately 
and  sufficiently  motived. 

This  much  can  be  said  with  certainty  concerning  the  emo¬ 
tions  of  Jesus,  namely,  that  he  was  never  their  victim.  His 
soul  was  raised  to  the  highest  heights  of  exaltation  and  ex¬ 
pectancy.  His  emotions  often  ran  high,  but  never  to  the  cloud¬ 
ing  of  a  clear  consciousness  nor  to  the  impairment  of  controlled 
conscience.  He  had  his  times  of  depression  and  he  must 
seek  and  struggle  for  clearness  regarding  the  divine  will.  But 
whether  exalted  or  depressed  in  soul,  the  issue  in  his  conduct 
is  always  the  same.  Pie  always  ranges  himself  within  the  dic¬ 
tates  of  the  divine  decision.  Moments  of  elation  do  not  destrov 

wJ 

the  compass  and  scope  of  his  reflection,  nor  deflect  him  from 
the  rigid  regime  of  righteousness.  Depression  does  not  de¬ 
velop  into  despondency  and  despair.  In  his  darkest  hour  he 
does  not  desert  God,  but  asks  why  God  has  deserted  him. 

Professor  Law  does  well  when  he  speaks  of  the  joy,  and 
not  of  joys,  of  Jesus  (p.  5).  We  never  see  Jesus  completely 
surrendering  himself  to,  or  exhausting  himself  in  a  single 
sentiment.  His  affective  life  and  impulses  are  regularly  held 
within  the  most  healthy  bounds  by  those  inhibitive  and  controll¬ 
ing  checks  which  govern  and  belong  to  the  highest  order  of 
personal  and  individual  self-discipline  and  control. 

B)  The  Intellect  of  Jesus 

Among  his  pathographers  de  Loosten  alone  recognizes  the 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


247 


exceptional  intellectual  ability  and  capabilities  of  Jesus.  For 
Binet-Sangle  Jesus’  words  and  teaching  are  merely  the  pitiable 
products  of  a  mind  that  had  completely  collapsed. 

It  is  only  later  in  the  course  of  a  psychosis  that  the  mind 
is  affected  and  intellectual  disturbances  begin  to  appear.  The 
psychopath  never  escapes  intellectual  deterioration  and  degen¬ 
eration,  except  in  certain  peculiar  types  of  paranoia  where  the 
intellect  can  remain  intact  for  a  considerable  period,  or  revive 
itself  to  intense  activity  during  periods  of  lucidity.  Intellec¬ 
tual  disturbances  may  be  formal,  affecting  the  processes  of  per¬ 
ception  and  the  most  elementary  thought  formations,  or  logi¬ 
cal,  affecting  the  content  of  thought. 

Anomalies  of  perception  and  association  are  to  be  observed 
when  these  processes  are  abnormally  slow  or  rapid.  When  the 
process  of  perception  and  association  is  abnormally  slow  there 
results  an  intellectual  stagnation  and  mental  monotony  due  to 
a  lack  of  variety  in  thought.  The  associative  process  does  not 
reach  its  goal;  in  more  serious  cases  of  mental  alienation  even 
the  simplest  associations  of  judgment  are  rendered  impossible. 
If  the  process  of  perception  and  association  of  ideas  is  abnor¬ 
mally  accelerated,  the  result  is  a  chain  of  disconnected  ideas 
illogically,  incoherently,  even  unintelligibly  expressed.  The 
very  flood  of  ideas  causes  a  complete  confusion  of  thought  and 
psychic  exhaustion.  This  wealth  of  ideas  renders  the  course 
of  thought  irresolute,  unstable,  and  infinitely  distractible.  The 
train  of  thought  will  not  proceed  systematically  to  a  definite 
aim,  hut  constantly  falls  into  new1  pathways  which  are  imme¬ 
diately  abandoned  again  (Kraepelin,  p.  37).  Krafft-Ebing 
speaks  of  other  formal  disturbances :  disturbances  of  associa¬ 
tion  in  so  far  as  certain  kinds  of  associations  predominate; 
anomalies  in  which  a  certain  limited  number  of  ideas  occupy 
consciousness  with  abnormal  intensity  and  duration ;  disturb¬ 
ances  of  apperception,  memory  and  imagination. 

Disturbances  in  the  content  of  thought  express  themselves 
in  delusions  which  dominate  the  thought,  experience,  feeling  and 
conduct  of  the  subject  due  to  an  inadequate  functioning  of 
reason  and  judgment.  It  does  not  follow  because  some  one  has 
expressed  a  delusional  idea  that  he  is  insane . Even  the 


248 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


circumstance  that  a  man  acts  in  accordance  with  the  delusion 
he  expresses  can  he  no  criterion  (Krafft-Ebing,  p.  71).  The 
delusion  of  a  sane  person  is  corrected  sooner  or  later  by  argu¬ 
ment  or  experience;  the  morbidly  deluded  person  is  accessible 
to  neither  of  these  corrective  factors.  The  delusion  needs  no 

other  support  than  the  absolute  conviction  of  the  deluded . 

At  the  height  of  the  disease  they  are  as  firmly  established  as 
reason  herself  (Kraepelin,  p.  49).  Insane  delusions  stand  in 
closest  relations  to  the  ego  of  the  patient ;  they  lead  to  a  falsi¬ 
fied  consciousness  and  an  erroneously  exalted  or  depreciative 
estimate  of  the  self  and  its  relation  to  the  outside  world. 

We  would  be  in  a  sorry  plight  if  we  were  solely  dependent 
upon  the  Fourth  Gospel  for  a  demonstration  of  the  intellectual 
resourcefulness  of  Jesus  and  his  freedom  from  delusions.  There 
we  find  no  short  pregnant  utterances,  no  rich  gnomic  and  im¬ 
pressive  sententious  words,  no  sharp,  telling,  pointed  answers 
(except  8,2-11,  which  must  be  genuine  because  it  is  so  thor¬ 
oughly  characteristic  of  Jesus  and  in  spite  of  the  weak  literary 
basis  and  the  lateness  of  its  incorporation  in  the  canonical 
text),  and  no  parables  which  in  the  Synoptics  are  so  remark¬ 
able  in  the  variety  and  richness  of  their  thought  that  Jesus 
stands  alone  in  history  as  the  unrivalled  master  of  this  form 
of  address  and  instruction.  In  the  Synoptics  Jesus  is  not  for¬ 
ever  discoursing  upon  himself  and  his  dignity  in  the  monoton¬ 
ous  repetitious  way  that  he  does  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  but  neg¬ 
lects  his  own  person  entirely  in  his  preaching  and  teaching  the 
kingdom  of  God,  and  in  a  way  that  causes  even  modern  peda- 
gogy  to  marvel  at  its  simplicity  and  effectiveness. 

Jesus’  faculties  of  observation  as  reflected  in  his  parables 
are  of  the  highest  order.  The  materials  of  his  perfect  percep¬ 
tion  he  reworks  and  reproduces  in  such  discourse  as  is  intel¬ 
ligible  to  the  most  ordinary  mind,  and  yet  stimulates  the  elite 
of  intellect  to  repeated  reflection.  The  characters  that  figure 
in  his  parables  are  not  always  moral  models  of  conduct  (the 
unrighteous  steward  in  Lc  16,1-13;  the  unjust  judge  in  Lc 
18,1-8),  but  they  are  always  true  to  life  and  are  drawn  from 
the  real  world  and  not  from  fable  and  fancy. 

It  is  worth  while  to  review  the  persons  and  things  that  fur- 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


249 


nished  the  suggestions  and  materials  for  his  parables.  They 
are  something  as  follows:  a  slave  serving  his  master;  servants, 
wicked,  faithful  and  unfaithful;  an  unrighteous  steward;  chil¬ 
dren  playing  in  the  market  place,  where  a  man  is  hiring  labor¬ 
ers  throughout  the  day  and  a  merchantman  is  buying  goodly 
pearls;  a  son  requesting  his  father;  a  pupil  and  his  teacher; 
a  thief  in  the  night ;  a  master  returning  late  to  his  house ;  a 
bridal  party  or  procession ;  a  man  building  a  tower ;  a  king 
going  to  war ;  a  man  and  his  adversary  on  the  way  to  the 
judge;  guests  choosing  preferred  places  at  a  feast;  a  friend 
disturbed  by  a  neighbor  in  the  night ;  a  widow  persistently 
pleading  her  cause  before  an  unjust  judge;  a  lender  and  his 
debtors;  a  shepherd  seeking  for  his  lost  sheep;  a  woman  sweep¬ 
ing  her  house  in  search  of  a  lost  coin ;  an  anxious  father  run¬ 
ning  to  greet  a  wTayward  son;  a  father  and  his  two  unlike 
sons ;  dishonest  husbandmen ;  a  sower  sowing  seed ;  a  woman 
mixing  dough ;  a  man  digging  in  a  field ;  the  discovery  of  a 
hidden  treasure ;  a  waylaid  traveller  aided  by  an  unknown 
friend;  a  strong  man  protecting  his  house;  a  rich  man  enlarg¬ 
ing  his  barns,  or  sitting  at  a  sumptuous  table  while  a  beggar 
starves  at  his  gate ;  a  barren  or  budding  fig  tree ;  a  sturdy  mus¬ 
tard  plant  in  the  garden ;  a  city  on  a  hill ;  a  candle  on  a  candle¬ 
stick  ;  a  new  patch  on  an  old  garment ;  an  old  skin  bursted  by 
new  wine;  seed  sprouting  from  the  earth;  tares  in  the  growing 
grain ;  eagles  circling  about  a  carcase ;  a  dragnet  cast  into  the 
sea;  a  sheep  in  a  pit;  money  set  at  interest;  salt;  light;  etc. 
(As  figures:  the  foxes  in  their  dens;  the  birds  of  the  air;  the 
flowers  of  the  field ;  wolves  among  the  sheep ;  harmless  doves ; 
shrewd  serpents;  etc.) 

Whenever  did  a  case  of  delusional  insanity  find  the  time 
and  inclination  to  notice  such  prosaic  pursuits  and  facts  of  life 
and  experience,  or  find  in  them  such  rich  suggestions,  or  em¬ 
ploy  them  as  universally  intelligible  vehicles  for  the  conveyance 
and  presentation  of  truths  that  survive  over  generations  and 
centuries?  Delusional  insanity  is  usually  characterized,  not  by 
great  wealth  of  ideas ,  such  as  we  see  in  Jesus’  parables,  but  by 
a  conspicuous  poverty  of  thought  (Kraepelin,  p,  38).  As  Dr. 
Moerchen  says,  psychically  and  nervously  mediocre  minds  pro- 


250 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


duce  for  the  most  part  fruits  that  represent  no  positive  values 
by  which  either  society  or  the  individual  would  experience  any 
enrichment  or  advance  (PH,  S.  46). 

Apart  from  his  parables  are  the  short  sententious  sayings 
and  the  paradoxical,  yet  pregnant  utterances  of  Jesus,  which 
are  not  the  products  of  an  intermittent  lucidity  but  of  an  in¬ 
tellect  constantly  intact  and  always  at  its  best  (Me  4,22  25  ; 
8,35;  9,35;  Lc  6,39;  11, 9f;  13,30;  14,11;  17,33). 

Concerning  the  more  distinctly  logical  faculties  of  Jesus 
we  have  abundant  evidences  of  their  capabilities  in  the  collec¬ 
tion  of  Galilean  contentions  in  Me  2, 1-3, 6  where  Jesus’  telling 
answers,  aided  by  his  command  of  his  people’s  Scriptures  and 
traditions,  prove  him  more  than  a  match  for  his  crafty  oppon¬ 
ents  and  establish  the  outposts  of  real  religion.  The  resource¬ 
fulness  and  play  of  Jesus’  intellectual  faculties  in  his  encoun¬ 
ters  with  his  Jerusalem  enemies  (Me  11,27-33;  12,13-17  18- 
27  28-34  35-37 ;  Jn  8,2-11),  as  de  Loosten  himself  states,  still 
await  their  parallels  in  history.  Here  Jesus  meets  his  enemies 
on  their  own  ground  and  defeats  them  with  their  own  weapons. 
When  he  goes  over  from  defense  to  offense  they  no  longer  dare 
to  ask  him  any  questions. 

To  conclude  this  section  by  applying  statements  of  Ribot 
on  the  delusional  diseases  of  personality  we  can  say:  in  Jesus 
we  find  no  change  in  mental  habitude,  no  shift  in  the  center  of 
gravity  of  his  consciousness ,  no  alteration  of  personality  or 
arrest  of  development,  no  fixed  or  erroneous  state  of  conscious¬ 
ness.  We  do  not  see  that  Jesus’  personality  was  drained  for 
the  profit  of  a  single  idea  (DP,  p.  119).  Jesus  was  not  a  case 
of  false  personality  reducible  to  a  fixed  idea ,  to  a  dominant 
idea,  toward  which  a  whole  group  of  concordant  ideas  con¬ 
verges,  all  others  being  eliminated,  practically  annihilated  (p. 
81).  No  single  issue,  not  even  the  kingdom  of  God,  no  single 
idea,  his  conviction  of  his  commission,  so  completely  engrossed 
and  engaged  the  mind  of  Jesus  that  it  resulted  either  in  the 
entire  or  partial  suppression  of  the  other  natural  and  normal 
elements  of  his  consciousness. 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


251 


C)  The  Will  of  Jesus 

Insanity  removes  the  possibility  of  free  will.  This  fact  is 
recognized  by  the  laws  of  all  civilized  nations  (Krafft-Ebing, 
p.  95).  The  motor  expressions  by  which  a  patient  realizes  his 
ideas,  feelings  and  impulses  are  very  important  in  the  diag¬ 
nosis  of  a  morbid  psychic  constitution.  The  morbid  disturb¬ 
ances  of  volition  are  as  follows:  diminution  of  volitional  im¬ 
pulse  which  is  marked  by  a  complete  suspension  or  paralysis 
of  will  and  in  which  the  strongest  moral  and  personal  incen¬ 
tives  are  unable  to  influence  the  patient  (abulia)  ;  unlimited 
increase  of  volitional  impulse  characterized  by  a  dispropor¬ 
tion  between  the  intensity  of  excitation  and  the  importance  of 
motives  (hyperbulia)  ;  impeded  release  of  volition  in  which 
special  exertion  is  necessary  in  every  act  of  will,  one  impulse 
is  suppressed  by  a  counter  impulse  and  the  flood  and  balance 
of  counter  impulses  results  in  a  blocking  of  the  will;  facilitated 
release  of  volition  in  which  there  is  an  uncontrolled  and  unre¬ 
stricted  discharge  of  impulses ;  deviated  direction  of  will  by 
external  and  internal  influences  as  in  hypersuggestibility  (where 
the  patient  is  a  prey  to  every  influence  even  the  most  acciden¬ 
tal),  distractibility  (where  sudden  resolutions  are  half  executed 
only  to  give  way  to  new  ones),  and  stereotypy  of  will;  the 
suppression  of  normal  will  by  morbid  impulses ;  and  the  con¬ 
version  of  natural  impulses  into  morbid  ones  (Kraepelin,  p. 

77ff). 

In  cases  of  impaired  or  diseased  volition  the  will  so  little 
resembles  a  faculty  reigning  as  mistress  that  it  depends  at  each 
instant  upon  the  most  trivial  and  hidden  causes;  it  is  at  their 
mercy  (Ribot,  DW,  p.  II).  The  patient  has  no  definite  reasons 
for  the  execution  of  his  acts;  they  occur  without  forethought; 
he  has  no  other  motive  than  that  he  must  do  this  or  that  with¬ 
out  knowing  why  or  to  what  end.  Rational  motives  neither 
stimulate  nor  restrain.  He  does  not  appreciate  the  futility  or 
the  inefficacy  of  the  methods  he  employs.  He  is  irresistibly 
driven  to  acts  which  he  later  recognizes  as  foolish,  or  even  re¬ 
probates  (see  Ribot,  DW,  p.  5Iff).  The  patient’s  will  ex¬ 
presses  itself  in  violent ,  purposeless  running  about,  or  impul - 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


252 

sive  acts  that  are  hardly  conscious ,  and  which  find  a  motive 
only  in  a  dim  consciousness  of  the  need  of  a  change  of  psychic 
situation  at  any  cost;  or  they  may  lead  finally  to  blind  ravings , 
true  psychic  convulsions ,  comparable  to  those  unconscious , 
violent  motor  explosions  that  characterize  an  epileptic  attach 
(KrafFt-Ebing,  p.  129). 

We  have  already  spoken  of  the  high  character  of  Jesus’ 
will  in  our  discussion  of  the  temptation  and  we  shall  refer  to 
it  again  in  the  section  on  fanaticism.  There  are  three  other 
Synoptic  incidents  that  throw  a  clear  light  upon  the  will  of 
Jesus :  the  close  of  the  inaugural  day  in  Capernaum  where  Jesus 
decides  upon  message  rather  than  miracle  as  the  essence  of  his 
mission,  feels  his  popularity  as  a  serious  moral  problem  to  which 
he  refuses  to  yield,  and  finds  the  possibility  of  a  degeneration 
into  a  professional  healer  repulsive  (Me  1,35-38)  ;  his  refusal 
to  respond  to  the  demand  for  a  sign  and  his  renewed  emphasis 
upon  message  and  not  miracle  (Me  8,ll-12=Mt  16,l-4=Lc 
11,29;  12,54-56);  and  the  Gethsemane  scene  where  he  sub¬ 
missively  bows  to  a  will  of  a  still  higher  order  at  the  price  of 
the  greatest  personal  sacrifice.  Besides  these  specific  instances 
are  those  fine  features  which  characterize  his  conduct  through¬ 
out  his  career :  the  careful  conscientiousness  with  which  he  de¬ 
voted  himself  to  the  fulfillment  of  his  commission  and  which 
always  distinguished  the  course  of  his  conduct,  his  refusal  to 
deviate  from  the  appointed  path  of  duty  in  lieu  of  selfish  in¬ 
terests  and  personal  preservation,  his  search  and  struggle  for 
orientation,  his  quest  for  and  openness  to  new  illuminations, 
and  his  calmness  and  composure  in  the  most  exacting  hours 
when  personal  demands  were  heaviest  upon  him. 

In  Jesus  we  see  no  morbid  perplexity  of  intellect ,  no  end¬ 
less  precautions ,  no  venting  of  self  with  reckless  prodigality 
in  speeches ,  projects ,  enterprises ,  and  incessant  fruitless  jour¬ 
neys  (Ribot,  DP,  p.  56),  no  dissolution  of  the  ego  either  by 
excess  or  defect  of  volitional  impulse,  no  infractions  of  perfect 
co-ordination  (DW,  p.  129),  no  two  contrary  or  different  ten¬ 
dencies  that  dominate  in  turn ,  no  two  alternate  centers  of  grav¬ 
ity ,  two  points  of  convergence  for  successively  preponderating 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


253 


but  partial  co-ordinations,  no  pathology  of  will  where  the  equil¬ 
ibrium  is  broken  and  where  the  intense  impulses  are  no  longer 
an  accident  but  a  habit,  no  longer  one  side  of  the  character  but 
the  character  itself  (p.  129f‘). 

Jesus  belongs  to  that  higher  order  of  wills  where  the  co¬ 
ordination  is  perfect  and  is  characterized  by  unit  if,  stability 
and  power  (p.  128).  He  belongs  to  that  class  of  great  men 
whose  end  remains  the  same  because  they  remain  the  same. 
Their  fundamental  element  is  a  mighty ,  inextinguishable  pas¬ 
sion  which  enlists  their  ideas  in  its  service . They  present 

a  type  of  life  always  in  harmony  with  itself,  because  in  them 
everything  conspires  together,  converges,  and  consents  (p. 
128f).  We  see  in  Jesus  the  will  of  the  rational  man  (which) 
is  an  extremely  complex  and  unstable  co-ordination  fragile  by 
its  very  superiority,  because  it  is  the  highest  force  which  nature 
has  developed — the  last  consummate  blossom  of  all  her  marvel¬ 
ous  works  (Alaudsley  as  cited  by  Ribot,  p.  131). 

The  wholesome  character  of  Jesus’  choices  and  decisions 
abundantly  attests  the  health  and  virtuous  vigor  of  his  wTill. 

5)  Was  Jesus  an  Epileptic? 

By  epilepsy  we  mean  a  pronounced  chronic  disorder  of  the 
central  nervous  system  which  is  characterized  by  frequently  re¬ 
curring  attacks  of  cramps  attended  by  loss  of  consciousness . 
or  by  the  partial  appearances  of  these  attacks,  or  by  the  psy¬ 
chopathic  attendant  or  subsequent  states  of  these  attacks;  only 
one  point  is  to  be  emphasized,  namely,  that  the  various  disturb¬ 
ances  appear  independent  of  objective  occasions' 


(1)  Man  versteht  unter  Epilepsie  eine  ausgesprochen  chronische  Er- 
krankung  des  Zentralnerv  ensy  stems,  die  durch  oefter  iviederkehrende 
Krampf  anfaelle  mit  Bezousstlosigkeit  oder  durch  Teilerscheinungen  dieser 
Anfaelle  oder  durcli  psychopathologische  Begleit-  und  Folgezustaende 
dieser  Anfaelle  gekennzeiclinet  ist ;  hervorzuheben  ist  nur,  dass  die  ver- 
schiedenen  Stoerungen  unabhaengig  von  aeusseren  Gmenden  auftreten 
(E.  Schultze,  S.  323;  for  special  studies  of  epilepsy  see  Schultze’s  chapter 
in  Binswanger's  textbook,  S.  322-346;  Kraepelin,  p.  434-456;  Krafft-Ebing, 
p.  472-492). 


254 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


The  chief  symptom  of  epilepsy  is  the  classic  epileptic  attack 
( [haut  ou  grand  mal).  In  this  attack  the  victim  suffers  a  com¬ 
plete  loss  of  consciousness  and  undergoes  the  most  violent  so¬ 
matic  convulsions;  his  face  turns  pale,  he  falls  to  the  ground 
with  rigid  body  and  muscles,  head  drawn  to  one  side  with  eyes 
fixed  at  an  angle  and  protruded  tongue.  Presently  the  rigid 
somatic  state  is  broken ;  the  eyes  begin  to  roll ;  the  head  ham¬ 
mers  up  and  down;  foam  gushes  from  the  mouth;  respiration 
comes  by  fits  and  starts,  and  the  muscles  convulse  violently. 
Such  an  attack  usually  leaves  the  victim  exhausted,  with  ach¬ 
ing  head  and  muscles,  agitated,  and  in  a  confused  state  of  mind. 
It  is  frequently  attended  by  horrible  hallucinations. 

Epilepsy  in  its  serious  form  leads  sooner  or  later  to  altera¬ 
tions  of  the  emotions,  intellect,  consciousness,  and  character. 
There  is  a  complete  loss  of  memory  for  the  period  of  the  at¬ 
tack;  a  general  aggravation  and  retardation  of  all  psychic 
processes  for  the  immediate  or  remoter  future;  attention,  com¬ 
prehension,  and  logical  judgment  are  disturbed  or  even  lost; 
aphasia  often  results  for  a  shorter  or  longer  period;  there  is 
a  marked  poverty  of  thought  and  adequate  expression ;  address 
is  no  longer  coherent  and  connected,  but  abrupt  and  jerky;  the 
result  is  stupor  or  dementia.  The  victim  has  not  the  will  to 
think,  will,  or  work.  Chronic  convulsions  render  him  incap¬ 
able  of  the  higher  grades  of  mental  and  physical  accomplish¬ 
ment.  The  affective  life  is  not  only  disturbed  but  often  per¬ 
verted.  Delirious  states  of  consciousness  come  to  constitute 
the  character;  the  deliriums  may  take  the  form  of  religious 
expansive  ideas,  or  of  moria. 

Chronic  epilepsy  usually  results  in  a  change  of  the  char¬ 
acter  ;  of  all  clinical  characters  the  epileptic  is  the  least  con¬ 
sistent.  This  change  is  usually  in  the  direction  of  moral  and 
ethical  degeneration  due  to  the  loss  of  such  judgments.  The 
epileptic  is  depressed,  pessimistic,  distrustful,  fearful,  terror¬ 
ized  ;  he  is  capricious,  peevish,  ill-humored,  impatient,  irritable, 
fault-finding,  obstinate,  morose,  unruly,  tyrannical,  quarrel¬ 
some,  wrathful,  threatening,  combative,  ruthless  (1),  violent, 

(1)  Ruecksichtslos  gegen  andere  verlangt  der  Epileptiker  fuer  sich 
die  groesste  Ruecksichtsnahmej  Schultze,  S.  334. 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


255 


brutal,  dangerous,  criminal ;  he  is  egoistic,  contemptuous,  un¬ 
compromising,  bigoted,  and  hypocritical.  Over  against  this  he 
may  be  a 

toward  religion  Samt  writes:  Poor  epileptics ,  who  with  a 
prayer-book  in  the  pocket  and  a  word  of  God  on  the  tongue , 
have  the  most  extreme  wickedness  in  the  heart  (quoted  by 
Krafft-Ebing,  p.  474). 

In  petit  mol  are  to  be  observed  befogged  states  of  con¬ 
sciousness,  also  cloudy,  dreamy  and  twilight  states ;  only  par¬ 
tial  losses  or  brief  interruptions  of  consciousness  completely 
without  or  only  slight  somatic  convulsions,  as  in  dizziness  or 
fainting;  absentia,  loss  of  orientation  restored  by  heavy  and 
slow  reflection. 

We  recall  that  Rasmussen  finds  in  the  public  career  of  Jesus 
instances  of  both  types  of  epileptic  attack,  petit  mol  in  Geth- 
semane,  and  grand  mat  at  the  cleansing  of  the  temple.  But 
when  psychiatrists  today  admit  great  difficulties  in  diagnosing 
epilepsy  in  a  living  person  under  careful  and  continued  obser¬ 
vation,  we  can  see  how-  little  worth  attaches  to  Rasmussen’s 
pathographic  diagnosis.  (Krafft-Ebing  writes,  A  single 
symptom  is  not  sufficient  to  establish  the  diagnosis  of  epilepsy 
nor  is  a  single  epileptic  attack;  p.  473).  Our  study  of  the 
biographical  incidents  showed  us  that  pathographic  materials 
are  to  be  exploited  neither  from  the  Gethsemane  incident  nor 
from  the  cleansing  of  the  temple.  Nowhere  in  the  Gospels  do 
we  find  an  experience  or  incident  in  the  life  of  Jesus  comparable 
to  either  petit  or  grand  mol. 

The  Sjmoptists  were  not  unacquainted  with  psychic  abnor¬ 
malities  and  their  symptoms  ;  they  often  do  not  neglect  to  de¬ 
scribe  them,  Me  l,26=Lc  4,35;  Me  5,2-5  15=Mt  8,28=Lc 
8,27  29.  Mt  4,24  tells  us  that  epileptics,  tfg^qvia^opsvonc;, 
were  among  the  classes  of  afflicted  cured  by  Jesus.  One  cure 
of  Jesus  reported  by  all  three  Synoptists  is  so  clear  in  its 
description  that  the  paragraph  Me  9,14-27  (=Mt  17,14-18 
— Lc  9,37-42)  bears  the  title,  “The  Epileptic  Boy.”  Mt  alone 
speaks  of  the  boy  as  epileptic,  tfeXqv lateral. 


foolishly  frivolous  character.  Of  those  who  turn 


256 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


My  son .  is  epi¬ 

leptic ,  and  suffereth 
grievously 


for  oft-times 
he  falleth 

into  the  fire,  and  oft- 
times  into  the  water. 


the  demon  went 
out  of  him. 


My  son. .  .hath  a  dumb 
spirit ; 

and  whenever 
it  taketh  him 

it  dasheth  him 
down;  and  he  foameth, 
and  grindeth  his 
teeth,  and  pineth 
away:  and  oft-times 
it  hath  cast  him  both 
into  the  fire  and 

into  the  waters 
to  destroy  him ;  the 
spirit 

tare  him  grievously ; 
and  he  fell  to  the 
ground,  and  wallowed 
foaming . ...  How  long 
time  is  it  since  this 
hath  come  upon  him?.. 
From  a  child. . .  And 
having  cried  out  and 
torn  him  much,  he  came 
out ;  and  the  boy 

became  as  one  dead; 
insomuch  that  the  more 
part  said  He  is  dead. 


and  behold 
a  spirit  taketh  him, 
and  he  suddenly  crieth 
out;  and  it  teareth 
him  that  he  foameth, 
and  it  hardly  departeth 
from  him,  bruising  him 
sorely. 


the 

demon  dashed  him 
down 

tare  him  grievously. 


In  reading  Me  here  we  can  almost  imagine  ourselves  read¬ 
ing  an  account  of  a  clinical  case  of  epileptic  grand  mal  attack 
in  a  textbook  on  psychiatry.  If  Jesus  had  suffered  with  epil¬ 
epsy  it  is  impossible  that  the  observer  whose  report  lies  at  the 
base  of  Mc’s  account  could  have  been  mistaken  as  to  the  nature 
of  his  malady.  Rasmussen  must  resort  to  the  idea  that  Jesus’ 
biographers  purpose!}7  left  out  what  they  knew,  but  he  thus 
leaves  us  unclear  as  to  how  they  could  ever  have  been  impressed 
by  a  morbid  man  or  inspired  to  recount  not  only  his  public 
words  and  deeds  but  believe  in  him  as  the  Messiah.  Rasmus¬ 
sen  encounters  here  the  same  order  of  moral  and  historical  dif¬ 
ficulty  in  accounting  for  the  origin  and  rise  of  the  early  Chris¬ 
tian  faith  and  community  as  Reimarus  did  when  he  explained 
the  resurrection  by  the  disciples’  theft  of  the  dead  body  of 
Jesus  from  the  tomb. 

Our  previous  study  of  the  psychic  side  of  Jesus’  life,  in  so 
far  as  it  is  accessible  to  our  study,  shows  us  that  his  person 


THE  FATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


257 


and  character  manifest  none  of  those  degenerations  commonly 
subsequent  in  cases  of  chronic  epilepsy. 

6)  Was  Jesus  a  Paranoiac? 

Our  reviews  of  the  positions  of  de  Loosten,  Hirsch,  and 
Binet-Sangle  made  it  clear  to  us  what  these  pathographers 
mean  by  the  religious  paranoia  of  Jesus.  We  can,  therefore, 
dispense  with  a  full  presentation  of  this  disease-picture,  except 
in  its  briefest  and  most  characteristic  outlines.  (For  brief 
psychiatric  studies  of  paranoia  see  E.  Siemerling’s  chapter  in 
Binswanger’s  textbook;  S.  160-191;  Kraepelin,  p.  423-433; 
Krafft-Ebing,  p.  368-413.) 

Kraepelin  thus  defines  this  disease:  Paranoia  is  a  chronic 
progressive  psychosis  occurring  most  in  early  adult  life,  char¬ 
acterized  by  a  gradual  development  of  a  stable,  progressive 
system  of  delusions,  without  marked  merited  deterioration,  cloud¬ 
ing  of  consciousness,  or  disorder  of  thought,  will,  or  conduct 
(p.  423).  E.  Siemerling  takes  exception  to  this  definition  of 
Kraepelin  because  he  finds  it  too  narrow  and  such  cases  too 
rare ;  he  includes  under  paranoia  those  delusional  psychoses 
which  involve  minor,  or  even  major,  intellectual,  affective  and 
motor  disturbances  and  deteriorations.  But  Kraepelin  in  an¬ 
other  connection  (p.  53)  speaks  of  paranoia  as  almost  always 
involving  a  decided  weakness  of  judgment.  In  religious  para¬ 
noia  the  delusions  have  regular  religious  content  and  character 
and  terminate  in  states  of  mental  weakness  (Krafft-Ebing,  p. 
406). 

Krafft-Ebing  in  the  observation  of  one  thousand  cases  of 
paranoia,  never  found  one  free  from  hereditary  taint;  others 
admit  that  the  percent  is  exceedingly  high.  The  onset  of  the 
disease  is  gradual,  often  unobserved,  and  its  course  is  pro¬ 
tracted.  At  its  acme  the  whole  realm  of  the  subject’s  experi¬ 
ence  is  changed.  Perception  is  falsified  and  real  experiences 
are  misinterpreted.  Fie  not  only  has  a  false  apprehension  of 
self,  but  of  his  environment.  The  whole  world  of  persons  and 
things  secretly  plots  against  his  welfare  (delusions  of  perse¬ 
cution),  or  publicly  and  privately  does  him  homage  (delusions 
of  grandeur). 


258 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


These  delusions,  single  or  combined,  occupy  the  citadel  of 
consciousness ;  they  characterize  and  control  the  whole  disease- 
picture.  They  are  held  with  great  persistency.  Hallucina¬ 
tions  contribute  to  the  rise,  reinforcement,  character,  content 
and  claims  of  the  delusions.  The  subject  is  frequently  unre¬ 
servedly  dominated  by.  his  hallucinations  and  he  abandons  him¬ 
self  to  them  in  an  unrestrained  way.  In  reality  the  patient's 
attitude  toward  his  illusions  and  hallucinations  is  not  the  same 
as  his  attitude  toward  his  actual  perceptions.  No  healthy  in¬ 
dividual  would  refer  to  himself  such  words  as  “ That  is  the 
President and  then  immediately  believe  that  he  must  be  the 
president.  But  when  these  words  form  the  keystone  of  a  long 
chain  of  secret  misgivings ,  an  hallucination  of  that  sort  makes 
the  most  profound  impression ,  and  immediately  there  arises  a 
firm  conviction ,  not  only  that  the  words  were  really  spoken,  but 
that  they  express  the  truth  (Kraepelin,  p.  10). 

The  delusions  usually  become  methodically  systematized  and 
coherently  combined  into  a  formal  delusional  structure.  When 
thus  systematized  these  delusions  result  in  a  complete  meta¬ 
morphosis  of  the  entire  personality.  The  ego  constitutes  a 
nucleus  or  keystone  about  which  all  the  falsified  items  of  exper¬ 
ience  logically  gather  contributing  to  and  supporting  the  de¬ 
lusional  structure.  The  subject  is  borne  along  by  an  extremely 
exalted  sense  of  self  and  an  exaggerated  feeling  of  his  own 
importance.  The  emotional  attitudes  usually  correspond  to  the 
character  of  the  delusions.  The  intellect  often  remains  rela¬ 
tively  well  intact.  The  paranoiac  is  often  capable  of  remark¬ 
able  reasoning,  however  from  false  premises,  and  one  is  often 
struck  by  his  logic  and  clearness.  But  his  critical  and  correc¬ 
tive  powers  are  usually  seriously  impaired  or  entirely  lost.  A 
correction  of  his  delusion  is  practically  excluded.  Considera¬ 
tions  learned  by  experience,  possibility,  probability,  logic,  in¬ 
struction,  and  even  moral  and  ethical  considerations  of  con¬ 
science  are  of  no  avail.  Even  the  much  remarked  periods  of 
lucidity  are  of  ephemeral  duration  (Krafft-Ebing) . 

The  contrast  of  Jesus’  character  to  that  of  the  paranoiac 
we  have  already  pointed  out  in  the  discussion  of  his  self-con¬ 
sciousness.  The  main  difficulty  in  a  diagnosis  of  paranoia  in 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


259 


the  case  of  Jesus  is  the  demonstration  of  delusions  with  which 
he  suffered,  and  which  falsified  his  experience  and  completed 
a  change  and  transformation  of  his  personality.  Jesus’ 
thought,  as  we  saw  in  our  study  of  the  egocentric  words 
ascribed  to  him,  does  not  center  upon  himself  but  upon  the 
kingdom  of  God.  The  sources  furnish  us  no  hallucinatory 
materials  that  kindled  and  fired  him  to  delirious  delusions  about 
his  own  dignity.  Never  once  does  he  present,  nor  even  refer 
to  any  credentials  of  authority  for  his  commission.  What  and 
how  Jesus  thought  of  himself  is  insolubly  problematic.  On 
this  point  the  paranoiac  never  leaves  those  whom  he  encoun¬ 
ters  long  in  doubt.  Jesus  never  seems  concerned  about  con¬ 
vincing  others  of  any  exalted  dignity,  or  present  or  future 
identity  that  he  possesses  or  that  awaits  him.  Here  we  cannot 
but  think  of  the  pitiable  attempts  of  the  paranoiac  who  packs 
about  with  him  the  most  meaningless  scraps  of  paper  in  which 
he  deliriously  discovers  the  official  documents  confirming  his 
delusion  and  with  which  he  would  convince  others  that  he  is 
right  and  that  they  are  wrong  unless  they  concede  his  claims. 
Jesus  never  made  claims  in  his  own  behalf,  except  as  a  called 
preacher  and  prophet  of  the  kingdom  of  God  for  which  he  de¬ 
manded  serious,  yet  sane,  moral  and  ethical  preparation.  He 
was  never  guilty  of  lapses  or  breaches  in  the  critical  correc¬ 
tives  that  are  naturally  furnished  by  healthy  mentality  and 
experience. 

7)  Was  Jesus  an  Ecstatic?  (1) 

Ecstasy  belongs  to  those  unusual  psychic  phenomena  which 
lie  on  the  borderland  between  mental  health  and  malady.  It 
is  unquestionably  an  abnormal  disturbance  of  consciousness, 
but  it  is  not  a  signal  symptom  of  mental  alienation.  Ecstatic 
states  may  appear  and  frequently  do  appear  within  the  limits 
of  psychic  health ;  however,  they  are  often  the  products  of  a 
diseased  nervous  system  and  are  psychopathic  in  their  origin 
(«)■ 

(1)  Ekstatiker  ist  ueberhaupt  kein  klinisch  scharf  zu  umschreibender 
Be  griff  (Weber,  Sp.  234). 

(2)  On  ecstasy  see  Ribot,  DW,  p.  94-103;  Cutten,  chapter  IV. 


260 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Ribot  classes  ecstasy  among  the  diseases  of  the  will ;  the  mental 
state  of  ecstasy  is  a  complete  infraction  of  the  laws  of  the  nor¬ 
mal  mechanism  of  consciousness  (DW,  p.  101);  it  marks  the 
extinction  of  volition ;  it  is  the  annihilation  of  the  will  in  its 
highest  form  (p.  103).  Ribot,  however,  is  not  passing  these 
judgments  from  the  strictly  psychiatric  point  of  view. 

The  ecstatic  state  does  not  involve  the  loss  of  consciousness ; 
it  is  rather  the  highly  intense  focalization  of  consciousness 
within  the  most  compact  compass.  The  whole  of  consciousness 
is  absorbed  in  just  one  item  and  such  collateral  matter  as  may 
contribute  to  it ;  all  else  is  excluded.  As  general  psychic  char¬ 
acteristics  of  the  ecstatic  state  Ribot  lists :  exhaustive  focus¬ 
ing  of  the  attention  upon  one  idea,  usually  abstract ;  loss  of 
normal  self-control;  extinction  of  general  sensibility;  intense 
emotional  excitement ;  subsequent  memory  and  reproduction 
of  the  elements  of  the  experience.  The  ecstatic  state  is  usually 
of  an  agreeable,  lulling,  rapturous  nature  and  the  subject  de¬ 
plores  its  departure  and  his  return  to  the  real  world ;  this 
often  leads  to  intemperate  indulgence. 

When  this  state  is  attained ,  the  ecstatic  presents  certain 
physical  characteristics :  sometimes  motionless  and  mute;  some¬ 
times  expressing  the  vision  that  possesses  him  by  words ,  songs , 
and  attitudes.  He  rarely  moves  from  his  position.  His  physi¬ 
ognomy  is  expressive;  but  liis  eyes ,  even  though  open ,  do  not 
see.  Sounds  no  longer  affect  him;  save,  in  some  cases,  the  voice 
of  a  particular  person.  General  sensibility  is  extinct;  no  con¬ 
tact  is  felt;  no  pricking  nor  burning  causes  pain  (Ribot,  DW, 
p.  95f). 

Habitual  ecstatics  flee  society  and  seek  out  seclusion  and 
solitude  in  order  to  give  themselves  in  an  undisturbed  way  to 
their  visions  and  hallucinations.  Ecstasy  is  usually  the  natural 
and  spontaneous  expression  of  the  ecstatic  constitution ;  how¬ 
ever,  it  may  be  produced  by  artificial  means  as  the  biographies 
and  autobiographies  of  various  religious  mystics  abundantly 
attest  (1).  For  the  habitual  ecstatic  his  experiences  of 

(1)  Saint  Teresa  is  the  most  interesting  and  instructive  ecstatic  char¬ 
acter  in  the  ecclesiastical  calendar;  see  Ribot’s  extracts  from  her  auto¬ 
biography,  (DW,  p.  96ff). 


THE  PATHQGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


261 


ecstasy  become  so  rare  in  the  rapture  they  afford,  so  deliciously 
delightful,  that  they  become  goals  of  conscious  effort,  ends  in 
themselves  instead  of  means  of  inspiration  and  vehicles  of 
revelation.  His  joy  and  exaltation  during  such  times  are  so 
completely  intoxicating  that  he  not  only  decidedly  desires,  but 
deliberately  devises  their  return  and  reproduction. 

Of  all  the  canonical  Scriptures  the  book  of  Ezekiel  is  rich¬ 
est  and  most  elaborate  in  visions ;  among  Biblical  ecstatics 
Ezekiel  occupies  the  chief  seat.  In  his  inaugural  vision  and 
prophetic  call  (chapters  1-3)  he  sees  all  sorts  of  fantastic  fig¬ 
ures  and  he  swallows  a  written  roll  presented  to  him  for  con¬ 
sumption  by  a  mysterious  hand ;  in  chapter  4  he  receives  the 
symbols  portraying  the  siege  of  the  holy  city;  in  chapters  8-11 
he  sees  cherubim,  fiery  coals  carried  in  the  naked  hand,  and 
celestial  chariots  with  whirling  wheels ;  his  vision  of  the  temple 
in  chapters  40-48  constitutes  a  marvel  of  memory.  His  strik¬ 
ing  experiences  are  not  purely  psychic,  but  are  attended  by 
unusual  somatic  symptoms.  He  is  overwhelmed  for  seven  days 
(anesthesia)  in  3,15f ;  he  is  struck  dumb  (aphasia)  in  3,25f 
and  he  regains  his  speech  in  24,25ff  or  in  33,21  f ;  in  4,4-8  he 
lies  390  days  on  his  left  side  and  then  40  days  on  his  right 
side  (hemiplegia)  as  respectively  symbolic  of  the  fates  of  Israel 
and  Judah. 

These  somatic  symptoms  have  led  even  liberal  theologians 
to  regard  Ezekiel  as  a  cataleptic.  Bernhard  Duhm  writes : 
It  is  possible,  even  probable,  that  lie  from  time  to  time  fell 
into  dreamy  cataleptic  states  and  that  during  such 
moments,  or  rather  hours  and  days,  he  beheld  a  host  of  pic¬ 
tures,  forms  and  dramatic  transactions  pass  before  him,  to 
which  he  ascribed  an  objective  reality  when  in  fact  they  were 
but  the  product  and  continuation  of  the  study  and  reflection 
pursued  by  him  during  clear  consciousness  (S.  231)  (1). 

Dr.  Dieckhoff  protests  against  the  liberal  theological  view 
of  Ezekiel  as  a  psychopath  (he  has  Orelli  specially  in 
mind).  In  spite  of  all  the  autobiographic  materials  found 
in  the  book  of  Ezekiel  he  finds  that  it  is  not  at  all  necessary  to 

(1)  On  this  point  see  Dr.  A.  C.  Knudson’s  The  Beacon  Lights  of 
Prophecy,  (p.  216ff). 


262 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


think  of  Ezekiel  as  a  psychosis.  He  concludes  his  article  on 
this  great  prophet  by  stating  that  his  study  is  an  attempt  to 
show  that  that  in  the  prophet  Ezekiel  which  is  regarded  by 
positive  theology  as  miracle ,  by  many  as  invention  with  a  pur¬ 
pose,  by  others  to  some  extent  the  product  of  a  psychic  disor¬ 
der,  that  all  that  according  to  our  modern  views  and  knowledge 
can  be  described  without  affectation  as  the  ideas  and  acts  of  a 
highly  gifted  and  psychically  sound  man  (S.  206). 

When  Dr.  Dieckhoff  from  the  medical  viewpoint  so  stoutly 
defends  the  psychic  health  of  Ezekiel,  whose  prophecies  are  so 
abundant  in  pathographic  materials  in  comparison  with  the 
Gospel  account  of  Jesus,  the  demonstration  of  an  ecstatic  con¬ 
stitution  in  the  case  of  Jesus  is  hopeless.  In  the  Gospels  we 
find  not  the  slightest  trace  of  Jesus’  entrance  into  or  emergence 
from  a  state  of  ecstasy;  however,  we  do  have  an  account  of 
the  emergence  of  the  disciples  from  a  state  of  vision  on  the 
mount  of  transfiguration  in  Me  9,6-8=Mt  17,5-8=Lc  9,3-4-36. 
The  only  possible  usable  material  is  the  vision  at  the  baptism, 
but  this  account  is  so  expressive  of  Mc’s  theology  and  christ- 
ology  and  the  repetition  of  the  same  words  by  the  voice  at  the 
transfiguration  (Me  9,7=Mt.  17,5=Lc  9,35)  and  in  the  mouth 
of  the  centurion  at  the  foot  of  the  cross  (Me  15,39=Mt  27, 
54)  makes  the  exact  location  of  this  revelation  uncertain,  or 
it  may  even  be  regarded  as  expressing  an  early  Christian  con¬ 
viction  rather  than  a  moment  of  special  exaltation  in  the  ex¬ 
perience  of  Jesus.  No  such  special  moments  stand  out  as  mile¬ 
stones  in  his  experience.  He  never  once  refers  to  such  in  pub¬ 
lic  or  in  private.  He  never  recounts  his  call  as  coming,  or  his 
message  as  imparted,  at  some  special  time  or  place  in  some 
striking  psychic  manner.  Jesus’  consciousness  of  his  call  and 
his  conviction  concerning  his  commission  rested  upon  some¬ 
thing  far  deeper  and  more  fundamental  than  the  work  of  a 
single  moment  or  series  of  states  of  ecstatic  exaltation. 

Throughout  his  book  Holtzmann  must  so  modify7-  and  ex¬ 
plain  the  peculiar  variations  of  Jesus’  case  of  ecstasy  from 
the  ordinary  type  as  it  is  commonly  known  that  when  he  has 
finished  with  his  modifications  and  explanations  we  wonder  if 
we  have  anything  of  regularly  recognized  ecstasy  left  in  Jesus. 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


263 


He  must  concede  that  the  ecstatic  element  in  Jesus  was  only 
one  element,  that  it  did  not  stir  him  to  restlessness,  as  is  usually 
the  case,  but  imparted  composure  (S.  42),  that  Jesus  as  an 
ecstatic  calmed  contagion  rather  than  spread  it  (S.  95),  and 
that  his  own  non-ecstatic  features  are  so  prominent  that  one 
easily  overlooks  the  ecstatic  element  in  his  character  (S.  123). 

8)  Was  Jesus  a  Fanatic? 

From  the  strictly  scientific  point  of  view  fanaticism  is  a 
meaningless  and  useless  term  for  psychiatry,  although  there 
always  attaches  to  fanaticism  something  of  the  delusional. 
Hirsch  writes:  The  intensity  of  one's  actions ,  even  if  it  ap¬ 
proaches  fanaticism,  is  not  necessarily  a  symptom  of  disease. 
This  psychic  faculty  is  not  infrequently  found  in  great  men 
who  have  made  a  discovery  or  an  invention  in  the  acceptance 
of  which  they  have  met  with  the  strong  opposition  of  their 
contemporaries.  Ingenious  artists,  who  have  branched  out  into 
new'  paths  of  art,  are  often  forced  by  obstacles  and  opposition 
to  a  perfect  fanaticism  without  which  they  would  never  have 
reached  their  goal.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  a  well-known  fact 
that  actions  that  are  the  result  of  delusions,  are  most  intense, 
and  not  seldom  bear  the  character  of  fanaticism,  so  that  per¬ 
sistent  fanatics  arouse  at  least  the  suspicion  of  being  psychical 
anomalies  (p.  180;  Ger.  S.  185). 

Fr  om  the  standpoint  of  the  religion  of  healthy-mindedness 
Moses  writes:  The  very  word  fanaticism  suggests  immediately 
psychical  abnormality,  or  frenzy,  and  excessive  religious  ac¬ 
tivity,  and  this  is  in  general  what  it  really  is . The  very 

fact  that  men  devote  their  whole  lives  to  religion  and  hold  all 
other  human  interests  and  activities  in  contempt  is  sufficient 
proof  of  their  physical  unbalance  (p.  215f).  Professor  James 
found  that  religious  fanaticism  is  only  loyalty  carried  to  a 
convulsive  extreme  (p.  340)  ;  the  fanatic  is  a  theopath  of  nar¬ 
row  mind  and  active  will,  characterized  by  a  despotic  intellect 
and  temperament,  engrossingly  preoccupied  and  driven  by  a 
feverish  fervor.  Dr.  Moerchen  agrees  that  fanaticism  is 
founded  in  a  concurrence  of  limited  or  one - 


THE  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


264 

sided  intellectual  capacity  and  unbridled  will  (PH, 
S.  38)  (1). 

From  Reinhard  (1781)  down  to  Wernle  (1916)  not  one 
great  life  or  character  study  of  Jesus  has  left  the  question  of 
his  fanaticism  entirely  untouched.  As  no  other  theologian 
Reinhard  took  pains  to  defend  Jesus  against  the  suspicion  of 
fanaticism.  In  his  Plan  he  presents  Jesus  as  the  founder  of 
the  universal  religion  of  reason.  Jesus’  plan  was  not  a  chim¬ 
era,  an  impossible  dream,  the  foolish  project  of  a  fanatic,  for 
his  plan  contained  nothing  impossible.  He  writes:  He  (Jesus) 
sustained  opposition  gladly  and  condescended  to  answer  the 
most  absurd  objections  and  the  most  malicious  charges  with  an 
incredible  patience.  And  in  doing  so  he  never  broke  out  in 
heated  condemnation;  he  always  justified  himself  with  calm 
earnestness  and  noble  moderation  although  he  as  frankly  at 
times  announced  the  fateful  consequences  which  must  necessarily 
follow  upon  the  unprecedented  stubbornness  of  many  of  his 
enemies.  He  never  forced  the  truth  upon  anyone  (S.  214f). 
Fanatics  forget  their  actual  relationships ,  overlook  that  which 
lies  at  hand  and  often  in  daily  life  violate  the  commonest  rules 
of  prudence  as  soon  as  they  begin  to  act.  Here  also  the  mind 
of  Jesus  distinguishes  itself  in  a  most  favorable  fashion.  With 
all  the  zeal  with  which  he  embraced  his  great  plan  and  kept  it 
always  before  him,  he  never  lost  out  of  sight  the  position  in 
which  he  found  himself  with  his  people  and  devoted  himself  to 
the  trivial  concerns  that  were  brought  to  him  there  with  such 
a  perfect  wisdom,  with  such  a  practiced  sagacity  and  delib¬ 
eration,  that  it  might  seem  that  he  had  nothing  else  to  think 
of  but  them  (S.  414ff).  One  cannot  come  upon  the  suspicion 
of  fanaticism.  How  were  this  possible  in  a  mind  that  thought 
more  correctly,  clearly,  strongly  and  profoundly  than  any 
human  mind  has  ever  thought ?  Fanaticism  and  clarified  rea¬ 
son — who  can  conceive  of  these  two  things  united  in  a  mind,  if 
he  knows  human  nature?  Further,  one  does  not  perceive  in  the 
founder  of  the  Christian  religion  that  comfort  in  death  and 
that  rigid  unnatural  insensitiveness  which  distinguish  the  fan- 

(1)  On  fanaticism  see  James,  p.  338ff;  on  moral  fanaticism,  Kant, 
Kritik  der  praktuchen  Verrwnft,  (Reklam,  S.  87ff). 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


265 


atic  so  strikingly  (S.  432).  He,  the  greatest  of  all  reformers , 
was  a  man  of  gentlest  habits  in  whose  disposition  and  conduct 
no  trace  of  hot-tempered  excitement ,  frantic  impetuosity  and 
apathetic  harshness  is  discernible  (S.  440).  One  must  not  know 
what  fanaticism  is  if  one  should  be  able  even  to  divine  it  here. 
The  one  observation  that  the  predominant  tone  of  his  soul  was 
?wt  enthusiasm,  not  untamed  zeal  and  tempestuous  passion,  but 
a  calm  rational  composure  which  was  not  disturbed  and  inter¬ 
rupted  by  passing  fits  of  ecstasy  and  fanatical  fury;  this  single 
observation  destroys  all  suspicion  of  fanaticism  (S.  482)  (1). 

In  his  Jesus  Wernle  devotes  considerable  attention  to  the 
question  of  Jesus’  fanaticism  (see  p.  243-271).  In  reference 
to  Jesus’  hope  of  the  imminent  kingdom  of  God  he  writes:  It 
is  quite  clear  that  we  are  now  at  the  point  where  fanaticism 
and  earnest  expectation  border  close  on  each  other,  and  we 
involuntarily  look  about  for  a  reliable  criterion  of  the  saneness 
of  this  expectation.  First  and  foremost,  two  points  are  in¬ 
volved:  the  effect  of  this  exalted  hope  on  Jesus  and  his 
hearers,  the  connection  between  hope  and  demand,  and  the 
constancy  of  this  hope  in  Jesus  himself .  We  shall  have 
to  designate  a  hope  as  fanaticism  which  shifts  the  moral  cen¬ 
ter  of  piety  and  which  falls  in  danger  of  losing  its  stability  in 
default  of  the  fulfillment  of  the  hope  (S.  243).  In  reply 
Wernle  writes:  We  must  confidently  say:  although  the  par¬ 
ticulars  of  this  hope  were  not  fulfilled  and  the  deep  longing  flut * 
tered  restlessly  farther  and  farther  out  toward  the  wondrous 
future,  the  thing  that  remains  and  substantiates  itself  is  this 
fundamentally  serious  and  honest  self-command ,  this  pure  con¬ 
centration  upon  the  simple  and  central  duties,  the  refined  con¬ 
science,  the  unadorned  humility  and  the  new  exalted  earnest¬ 
ness.  From  these  fundamental  energies  the  new  religion  will 
live  and  through  them  will  find  a  way  to  survive  all  disappoint¬ 
ments.  The  charge  of  fanaticism  against  Jesus  collapses  in  the 


(1)  Upon  all  this  A.  Schweitzer  remarks,  How  fortunate  that  Reinhard 
did  not  surmise  how  enthusiastic  Jesus  was  and  how  he  trampled  reason 
under  his  feet  (GclLJF,  S.  34). 


266 


THE)  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


face  of  his  elementary  principle :  Whoever  doeth  the  will  of 
God  shall  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  God  (S.  251)  (2). 

We  see  in  Jesus  a  range  of  reflection,  a  reverence  and  re¬ 
gard  for  the  traditional  precepts  of  piety  and  yet  an  independ¬ 
ence  over  against  them  that  marks  a  distinct  advance,  a  moral 
code  and  control  of  conduct,  a  fearlessness  that  is  not  blinded 
to  the  futility  of  undertaking  certain  courses  of  action,  a  re¬ 
jection  of  the  principle  that  the  end  justifies  the  means,  an 
antipathy  for  acquiring  unfair  advantage,  a  sensitiveness  to 
suggestions  from  within,  without  and  above,  a  wealth  of  will 
unwasted  in  volcanic  vomitings,  a  depth  of  genuine  emotion 
devoid  of  stoicism  and  devoted  to  the  works  of  sympathy,  pity 
and  compassion,  a  consideration  for  contemporaries,  a  deter¬ 
minedness  of  devotion  to  duty  as  divinely  dictated,  a  careful, 
even  cautious  conscientiousness  of  commission,  an  insight  into 
the  worth  as  well  as  the  weakness  of  existing  institutions,  an 
appreciation  of  the  plainer  provisions  of  Providence  in  the 
beauties  of  nature  and  the  boon  of  life  itself,  and  a  willingness 
to  walk  and  work  along  the  more  placid  yet  more  painful  paths 
of  moral  progress;  of  all  of  which  the  confirmed  fanatic  is  in¬ 
capable. 

From  our  modern  point  of  view  Jesus’  picture  of  the  future, 
and  that  of  many  of  his  contemporaries,  was  fantastic  and 
fanciful,  but  it  was  not  fanatical.  It  was  not  the  one  bright 
point  that  glowed  and  glared,  and  upon  which  his  whole  atten¬ 
tion  was  centered  and  toward  which  his  acts  aggressed  to  the 
ruthless  rejection  of  all  else.  The  future,  what  and  who  was  to 
figure  in  it,  was  God’s  and  not  his. 

9)  Pathography 

Pathography,  even  when  modestly  and  carefully  under¬ 
taken,  has  its  serious  limitations.  A  diagnosis  based  upon 
archives  alone,  even  when  the  records  are  of  recent  date,  is 
always  dubious  and  still  more  so  when  they  date  from  antiquity. 
From  the  scientific  point  of  view  pathography  is  readily  ex- 

(2)  See  P.  W.  Sehmiedel’s  fine  paragraph  on  the  fanaticism  of  Jesus 
in  his  PJSMG,  S.  17. 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


267 


posed  to  very  definite  dangers,  the  chief  ot  which  Dr.  Moerchen 
designates  as  follows:  We  do  not  fail  to  realize  the  danger  that 
one ,  whose  intention  is  to  proceed  patho graphic  ally,  easily  falls 
victim  to  an  a  priori  procedure ,  that  is,  he  is  too  strongly 
inclined  as  a  matter  of  course  to  regard  all  states  of  sold  that 
deviate  from  the  norm  as  pathological,  an  error  from  which 
some  authors  at  least  have  not  held  themselves  guiltless  (PH, 
S.  8). 

In  investigating  the  biographies  and  autobiographies  of 
prominent  persons  for  morbid  psychic  manifestations,  patho- 
graphers  have  fallen  into  great  discredit  with  professional 
psychiatrists.  Dr.  Schaefer  writes:  Pathography  is  at  a  very 
low  rate  of  value,  even  in  the  estimate  of  its  psychiatric  col¬ 
leagues;  many  still  recl'cn  it  among  the  unprofitable  occupa¬ 
tions  (S.  10).  Modern  pathographies  do  not  represent  the 

best  in  our  clinical  research .  Pathography  as  scientific 

method  has  its  very  precarious  phases . Historical  research 

can  furnish  us  incontestably  only  detached  pathological  feat¬ 
ures  of  historical  personalities;  never  with  equal  certainty  can 
it  transmit  to  us  the  total  psychic  picture  (Weber,  Sp.  233). 
This  is  because  the  pathographers  have  played  fast  and  loose 
with  the  scientific  principles  of  psychiatry.  The  more  one 
reads  the  works  of  Rasmussen,  de  Loosten,  Hirsch,  and 
Binet-Sangle  the  less  one  is  impressed  with  them.  After  read¬ 
ing  and  rereading  the  works  of  Jesus’  pathographers  and  then 
the  works  of  recognized  psychiatrists  one  cannot  but  see  that 
Jesus’  pathographers  have  presented  only  the  sunnier  aspects 
cf  mental  alienation  which  might  find  parallels  in  the  experience 
of  any  normal  and  healthy  person,  but  which  are  not  at  all 
specially  characteristic  of  psychic  degeneracy,  and  have  left 
out  those  graver  psychic  phenomena  which  really  characterize 
the  insane.  Krafft-Ebing  reminds  his  medical  readers,  There 
is  no  functional  disturbance  that  occurs  in  the  insane  which  is 
not  occasionally  observed  within  the  limits  of  health  (p.  231). 

From  the  viewpoint  of  the  historico-critical  study  of  the 
New  Testament  those  who  pathographically  diagnose  the  case 
of  Jesus,  with  the  exception  perhaps  of  Rasmussen  (Holtzmann 
does  not  belong,  we  again  repeat,  to  the  pathographers  of 


268 


THE,  PSYCHIC  HEALTH  OF  JESUS 


Jesus),  are  unacquainted  with  even  the  more  general  course 
and  conclusions  of  the  New  Testament  criticism.  They  take  the 
Scriptures  with  a  gullible  literality  that  would  make  even  the 
most  uncritical  of  orthodox  souls  marvel  at  their  credulity  con¬ 
cerning  the  word  of  God.  They  confirm  the  exact  historical 
reliability  of  the  sources  of  our  knowledge  concerning  Jesus 
even  down  to  the  last  letter ;  they  are  sure  that  Jesus  spoke 
and  did  just  as  his  biographers  tell  us  and  always  in  the  deepest 
sort  of  sincerity  and  in  the  most  genuine  conviction.  But  all 
of  this  at  the  expense  of  Jesus’  psychic  health.  They  isolate 
words  and  incidents  from  their  connections  and  context  in  the 
Gospels  and  treat  them  pathographically  without  seeking  any 
insight  into  an  historical  plan  of  the  course  of  Jesus’  public 
career,  and  neglect  entirely  any  underlying  historical  motives 
that  might  explain  the  special  character  of  any  unusual  word 
or  incident  in  the  public  life  of  Jesus. 

A  pathography  of  Jesus  is  possible  only  upon  the  basis  of  a 
lack  of  acquaintance  with  the  course  and  conclusions  of  New 
Testament  criticism  and  an  amateur  application  of  the  prin¬ 
ciples  of  the  science  of  psychiatry. 

Further,  the  pathographers  of  Jesus  have  not  played  fair 
with  the  popular  mind  which  still  entertains  horrible  supersti¬ 
tions  about  insanity  and  its  symptoms  and  has  not  yet  been 
educated  and  accustomed  to  look  upon  pathological  states  of 
mind  as  diseases,  demanding  compassion,  if  possible  cure,  and 
adequate  care  in  exactly  the  same  way  as  do  the  diseases  of  the 
body. 

Last  of  all,  the  pathographers  of  Jesus  have  toyed  wantonly 
and  wilfully  with  the  one  figure  in  history  to  which  are  attached 
the  sincerest  sentiments  and  the  dearest  affections  of  the  occi¬ 
dental  religious  world;  and  without  sufficient  reason  or  justifi¬ 
cation. 

#  *  *  *  % 

We  have  reached  the  end  of  our  study  of  the  psychic 
health  of  Jesus.  In  conclusion  the  writer  attempts  no  delinea¬ 
tion  of  the  character  and  personality  of  Jesus.  Scores  have 
been  projected  in  the  course  of  the  life-of- Jesus  research,  a 
very  few  impressive  and  forceful,  some  helpful,  more  ordinary, 


THE  PATHOGRAPH  OF  JESUS 


269 


many  inferior  and  mediocre,  and  again  not  a  few  worthless, 
ridiculous  and  absurd.  Every  attempt  to  picture  Jesus  in  a 
modern  way  and  language  to  the  thought  of  a  modern  world 
seems  to  lack  something  vital  and  organic.  We  read  them  and 
we  lay  them  down  again  with  the  feeling  that,  though  we  have 
not  heard  the  last  loud  cry  on  the  cross,  the  life  has  gone  out 
of  him.  He  lives  best  in  the  New  Testament.  There  he  seems 
most  at  home.  There  he  does  and  speaks  as  man  never  yet  did 
or  spoke.  To  those  who  would  see  and  know  him  as  he  really 
was  and  is,  the  writer  would  recommend  that  they  take  up  the 
first  three  books  of  the  New  Testament  and  read  them  with  a 
will,  and  feel  again  the  warm  unartificial  and  natural  impres¬ 
sion  that  radiates  from  the  currents,  cross-currents,  and 
counter-currents  of  the  life  of  him  who  is  their  theme. 

Jesus  is  great  and  grand  enough  as  he  stands  in  the  New 
Testament  and  history.  No  matter  how  striking  the  style,  no 
matter  how  careful  the  command  and  choice  of  language,  we 
cannot  by  taking  either  thought  or  pen  add  a  single  cubit  to 
his  stature. 


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Voelter,  D. 

Die  evangelischen  Erzaehlungen  von  der  Geburt  und  Kind- 
lieit  Jesu  kritisch  untersuclit.  Heitz,  Strassburg;  1911, 
136  S. 

Volkmar,  Gustav 

Die  Evangclien.  Fues,  Leipzig;  1870,  660  S. 

Washburn,  L.  K. 

Jesus  Insane ?  Truth  Seeker,  New  York;  1889,  20  p. 
Weber,  William 

Review  of  Werner ,  Schaefer ,  Seeligmueller  in  the  Theolog- 
ische  Liter  at  urzeitung,  1911,  Nr.  8,  Sp.  232-36. 

Weidel,  Karl 

Jesu  Persoenlichkeit .  Eine  Charakterstudxe.  Marhold, 
Halle  a.  d.  S. ;  2.  Auflage,  1913,  128  S. 

Weinel,  H. 

IBN.  Ibsen.  Bjoernson.  Nietzsche.  Individualismus  und 
Christentum.  Lebensfragen.  Mohr,  Tuebingen ;  1908, 
211  S. 

Jesus  im  19.  J ahrliundert .  Lebensfragen.  Mohr,  Tuebin¬ 
gen  ;  3.  Neubearbeitung,  1911,  331  S. 

Paulus — Der  Menscli  und  sein  Werk.  Mohr,  Tuebingen  ; 
2.  Auflage,  1915,  291  S. 

Weiss,  B. 

The  Life  of  Christ.  Translated  by  J.  W.  Hope.  Clark, 
Edinburgh;  1909,  3  volumes,  1221  p. 

Weiss,  J. 

AeE  Das  aelteste  Evangelium.  Vandenhoeck  and  Rup- 
recht,  Goettingen;  1903,  111  S. 

PJvRG.  Die  Predigt  Jesu  vom  Reiche  Gottes.  Vanden¬ 
hoeck  und  Ruprecht ;  Goettingen,  1892,  67  S. 


280 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


Weiss,  J.,  u.  a. 

SdNT.  Die  Schriften  des  Neuen  Testaments  neu  ueber- 
setzt  und  fuer  die  Gegenwart  erklaert.  Vandenhoeck  und 
Ruprecht,  Goettingen;  3.  Auflage,  21.-28.  Tausend,  Band 
I:  Die  drei  aelteren  Evangelien,  1917,  511  S. 

Weisse,  Ch.  H. 

Die  evangelische  Geschichte  kritisch  und  philo  so phis  ch  be- 
arbeitet.  Breitkopf  &  Haertel ;  1838,  2  Baende,  1157  S. 

Weizsaecker,  C. 

Untersuchungen  ueber  die  evangelische  Geschichte :  ihre 
Quellen  und  den  Gang  Hirer  Entwicklung.  Mohr,  Tuebin¬ 
gen  &  Liepzig;  2.  Auflage,  1901,  378  S. 

Wellhausen,  J. 

Das  Evangelium  Lucae.  Reimer,  Berlin;  1904,  142  S. 

Das  Evangelium  Marci.  Reimer,  Berlin ;  2.  Ausgabe,  1909, 
137  S. 

Das  Evangelium  Mathaei.  Reimer,  Berlin;  2.  Ausgabe, 
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Einl.  Einleitung  in  die  drei  ersten  Evangelien.  Reimer, 
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Wendland,  P. 

Die  hellenistisch-roemische  Kultur  in  ihren  Beziehungen  zu 
Judentum  und  Christentum.  J.  C.  B.  Mohr,  Tuebingen ; 
2.  und  3.  Auflage  1912,  448  S. 

Wendling  E. 

Die  Entstehung  des  M arcus-Evangeliums.  Mohr,  Tuebin¬ 
gen;  1908,  246  S. 

Wendt,  H.  H. 

The  Teaching  of  Jesus.  Scribner’s,  New  York;  1892,  2 
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Werner,  Hermann 

PGJ.  Die  psychische  Gesundheit  Jesu.  Biblische  Zeit- 
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Verlag  von  E.  Runge,  Gr.  Lichterfelde,  Berlin;  IY.  Serie, 
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NKZ.  Der  historische  Jesus  der  liberalen  Theologie — Ein 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


281 


Geisteskr  anker.  Neue  Kirchliche  Zeitschrift;  herausgege- 
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XXII.  Jahrgang,  5.  Heft,  1911,  S.  317-390. 

Wernle,  Paul 

SF.  Die  synoptische  Frage.  Mohr,  Freiburg  in  B. ;  1899, 
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Die  Anfaenge  uns ever  Religion.  Mohr,  Leipzig  und  Tue¬ 
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Die  Quellen  des  Lebens  Jesu.  Religionsgeschichtliche 
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Life  of  Jesus.  Beacon  Press,  Boston;  1907,  163  p). 

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The  New  Testament  in  the  Original  Greek.  American 
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Jesus  de  Nazareth.  Chez  hauteur,  Lausanne;  1911,  2  vol¬ 
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Leben  und  Lehre  Jesu.  III.  Theologische  Rundschau. 
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David  Friedrich  Strauss.  Truebner,  Strassburg;  1908, 
2.  Teile,  777  S. 


INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES 


Old  Testament 


Exodus 

18,  . 161 

34,  28  . ..153 

Deuteronomy 

6,  4ff  .  10 

I.  Samuel 

10,  163 

19,  163 

I.  Kings 

19,  8  . 153 

II.  Kings 

9,  11  . 163 

Psalms 

2,  7  . 151 

Isaiah 

6,  Iff  . 202 

14,  12  . 210 

Jeremiah 

4,  19  .  62 

15,  10  . 62 

16,  1  .  62 

5  .  62 

17,  18  . 62 

18,  21  .  62 

20,  10  .  62 


13  . 

.  62 

29,  26  . . 

39,  26  . 

.  62 

Ezekiel 

1-3,  . 

. 261 

3-4,  . 

.  62 

3,  15f,  . 

. 261 

25f  . 

. 261 

4,  . 

. 261 

4,  4-8  . 

. 261 

8-11  . 

. 261 

24,  25  ff  . 

. 261 

33,  . 

.  62 

33,  21  ff  . 

. .261 

40-48,  . 

. . . 261 

Daniel 

7,  13  . 

. ....  .3,  59,  76,  217 

Hosea 

9,  7  . 

. 163 

Amos 

7,  14-15  . 

. 202 

Micah 

7,  6  . 

.  26 

Zechariah 

13 . 

. 163 

New  Testament 


itthew 

9ff  . . 

. .  98 

1,  18  . 

, .  69 

10  . 

........ .157 

20ff  . . 

. 235 

14ff  . 

. 154 

2,  13ff  . 

. 235 

17  . 

. 236 

15  ......... 

. 154 

24  . 

. 255 

18  . 

. 154 

5, 

2  . 

. 239 

19  . 

. 235 

3  . 

22  . 

. 235 

10  . . 

. 142 

3,  2  . 

. 237 

11  . 

. 142 

4  . 

. 163,  236 

32  . 

. 191 

7-10  . 

. . 163,  236 

39  f  . 

10  . 

. . .170 

6, 

1-18  . 

. 196 

13-17  . 

. 149ff 

5-15  . 

. 183 

16-17  . 

. . 50,  208 

6  . 

. 190 

17  . 

. 150f 

9ff  . . 

4,  1-11  . 

. . . . . 152ff 

16ff  . 

.  92 

3f  . 

. 98,  157,  208 

25-29  . 

.  99 

5-6  . 

. 208 

16  . 

. 167 

8-11  . 

. 208 

283 

7, 

9  . 

.  89 

284 


INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES 


Matthew  (Cont’d) 


12  . 

15ff  . 

. 103 

19  . 

21-23  . 

22-23  . 

23  . 

33  . 

8,  3  . 

3-4  . 

10  . 

. 244 

14-17  . 

. 203 

16  . 

18-22  . 

19-22  . 

.  73 

28  . 

. 255 

9,  1-17  . 

. 1195 

16-17  . 

.  12 

30  . 

,  . . . 244 

36  . 

. 244 

10,  1-11,  1  .... 

. 210 

4  . 

5  . 

.  85 

7  . . 

17-18  . 

. 141 

22a  . 

. 141 

23  . 

. 116,  121,  216 

32  . 

. 142 

33  . 

. 26,  139,  142f 

34  . 

. 26 

34ff  . 

. 53,  56 

35f  . 

.  26 

37  . 

. 85,  137,  191 

38  . 

39  . 

. 139 

40  . . 

. 137 

42  . 

. 140f 

11,  5ff  . .  - - 

7-19  . 

. 236 

11  . 

. .  72 

18  . 

. 70,  163,  237 

19  . . 

.  92 

20  . 

. 244 

20ff  . 

. 17,  27,  195 

25  . 

. 244 

25ff  . 

. 84,  100,  137f 

27  . 

. 137f 

28-30  . 

. 142 

12,  . 

. .  14 

1-14  . 

. . . 195 

6  . 

. 142 

12-13  . 

. 244 

16  . 

. 244 

18ff  . 

. 154 

24  . 

. 163 

26f  . 

.  51 

27  . 

.  13 

28  . 

. . .49,  51 

32  . 

33  . 

46  . 

46-50  . 

. 192ff 

13,  3-8  . 

12 

9  . 

12-23  . 

.  12 

18-21  . 

19-23  . 

35  . 

. 154 

37-43  . 

44f  . 

.  51 

49-50  . 

. 144 

54-58  . 

. 186,  195 

55  . 

55f  . 

. 236 

58  . 

14,  Ilf  . 

. 236 

14  . 

. 244 

23  . 

15,  1-20  . 

. 195 

32  . 

. 244 

16,  1-4  . 

. 157,  252 

2  . 

. 244 

17-19  . 

. 56,  144 

18  . 

22-23  . 

. 157 

23  . 

. 244 

24  . 

. 138f 

25  . 

. 139 

27-28  . 

. 216 

17,  1-8  . 

. 165ff,  208 

2  . 

. 239 

5  . 

. 167,  262 

5-8  . 

. 262 

14-18  . 

17  . 

. 244 

21  . . 

.  92 

24-27  . . 

.  54 

18,  2  . 

. 244 

3  . 

. 140 

5  . . 

. 140 

6  . 

. 140 

10  . 

. 113,  140 

14  . 

. . . 140 

16-17  . 

. 144 

16-18  . 

.  10 

19-20  . 

. 142 

22-34  . 

.  12 

19,  Iff  . 

. 185 

3-9  . 

. 191 

10-12  . 

. 191 

12  . 

.  74 

14  . 

. 140,  244 

INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES 


285 


Matthew  (Cont’d) 


14-15  . 

. . . 244 

15  . 

. 194 

17  . 

20-21  . 

. 244 

28  . 

. 51,  216 

29  . 

33  . 

. 143 

20, 

22f  . 

. 177 

34  . 

. 244 

21, 

11  . 

12-17  . 

. ..  . . 171ff 

18-20  . 

23ff  . 

. 174,  196 

26  . 

. .152 

32  . 

22, 

15-22  . 

. 196 

23-33  . 

. 196 

30  . 

. 191,  216 

31f  . 

41-46  . 

23, 

.  24 

1-36  . 

. 27,  196 

9  . 

.  58 

10  . 

. 142 

13-16  . 

.  52 

13-36  ....... 

I6ff  . 

. . . 197 

19-33  . 

.  15 

23  . 

.  52 

25  . 

.  52 

27  . 

.  52 

29  . 

.  52 

37-39  . 

39  . . . 

.  58 

24, 

9b  . 

. 141 

14  . 

23ff  . 

.  14 

30  . . 

30-36  . 

. 216 

35  . 

. 140 

37-41  . 

. 216 

42-44  . 

45-51  . 

. 216 

25, 

1-10  . 

1-12  . 

. . .  12 

1-13  . 

. 142,  216 

14-30  . 

.  12 

31-46  . 

. . . 216 

26, 

14ff  . 

25  . 

. 187 

29  . 

. 216 

36-46  . 

. 175ff 

37-38  . 

. 244 

47ff  . 

. 187 

51ff  . 

52-54  . 175 

63  . 103 

64  . 216 

27,  3-10  . 187 

32  . 240 

46  . 244 

54  . 262 

28,  7  . 167 

24  . 182,  184f,  197f 

18b  137 

Mark 

1,  6  . 163,  236 

9- 11  149ff 

10  . 210 

10- 11  . 50,  208 

12  .  51 

12-13  . 152ff,  203 

13b  c  . 208f 

14-15  . 150 

16-20  . 183f,  197 

17  .  98 

21  . 197 

21- 38  . 155,  183,  186 

25  . 244 

26  . 255 

29  . 197 

33  . 197 

35  . ..190 

35-38  .155,  157,  189,  203f,  252 

41  . 239,  244 

43  . 244 

45  . 189,  198 

2,  1  . 197 

2,  1-3,  6  . 186,  195,  250 

12  . 161 

15  . 197 

18  . 236 

•19  52 

22  .  92 

25  . 154 

3,  .  24 

1  . 197 

5  . 244 

6  . . 186 

9  . 197 

12  . 244 

19  . 182,  187,  197 

20  . 160,  198 

21  . 2,  27,  49,  75,  90,  118, 

159ff,  208,  235 

22  . 75,  160,  163ff,  208 

22- 30  .  49 

23  .  16 

30  . 49,  163f 

31  . 160,  197,  235 

31-35  . 27,  148,  160,  192ff 


28  6 


INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES 


Mark  (Cont’d) 


4,  1  . 

1-9  . 

.  51 

3  _ _ 

. 106 

10  . 

. 162 

13  . 

. 162 

13-20  . . . 

22  . 

. 250 

25  . 

. 250 

26-29  _ 

33  f  . 

. 162 

36  . 

38  . 

. 239 

39  f  . 

41  . 

. 197 

5,  2  . 

. 197 

2-5  . 

. 255 

15  . 

. 255 

17  . 

. 198 

18  . 

. 197 

21  . 

. 197 

25  IF  . 

_ 198,  208 

30  . 

.  76 

42  . 

6,  1-6  . 

. 186,  195 

2  . 

. 197 

3  . 

. 90,  235 f 

6  . 

. 244 

7-12  . 

. 210 

14fF  . 

. 236 

30-8,  26  . 

. 183 

31  . 

_ 108,  189 

32  . 

. 197 

34  . 

. 106,  244 

45-8,  26  . 

. 184 

46  . 

. 189f 

51  . 

_ 161,  197 

52  . 

. 162 

7,  1-23  . 

. 79,  195 

6-15  . 

.  52 

17  . 

. 197 

17-19 

. 162 

25  . 

. 49 

29  . 

. 198 

34  . 

. 244 

8,  2 . 

. 198,  244 

10  . . . . 

. . 197 

11-12  . .. . 

....157,  252 

12  . 

. 244 

13  . 

. 197 

16-21  .... 

. 162 

19  . 

. 206 

27fF  . 

....158,  204 

30 

.  73 

31  . 

.  .  .  .158,  176 

32f  . 

. 157,  197 

33  . 

. 102,  156,  244 

34  . 

34-9,  1  .... 

.  53 

35  . 

38  ........ 

38b-9,  1  ... 

9,  2-8  . 

. 1651F,  208 

6  . 

6-8  . 

7  . 

.  167.  262 

10  . 

14-27  . 

. 255 

18  . 

. 49 

19  . 

23  . 

.  52 

25  . 

.  49 

28  . 

. 197 

29  . . 

. 92 

31  . 

. 176 

32  . 

. 162,  197 

33  . 

35  . 

. 250 

36  . 

37  . 

. 137,  140 

38  . 

. 210 

41  . 

42  . 

. 140 

50  . 

10,  Iff  . 

. 185 

2-12  . 

10  . 

. 162,  197 

14  . 

. 140,  244 

15  . . 

16  . 

. 194,  239  244 

18  . 

. 58,  148 

21  . 

. 244 

28  . 

.  76 

29  . 

. 141 

32  . 

. 63,  176  197 

33  . 

. 142 

35  IF  . 

. 217 

38f  . . 

39  fF  . 

.  53 

42  . 

.  54 

42-45  . 

.  54 

45  . 

.  54 

52  . 

. 244 

11,  7  . 

.  91 

12  . 

. 239 

12-14  . 

14  . 

.  52 

15-19  . 

. 1714F 

16  . 

. 174 

17  . . 

. . . 154 

18  . 

. 174 

20-22  . 

. 168fF 

INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES  287 

Mark  (Cont’d) 

49  . 

. 70,  96,  148 

22-24  . 

.  52 

50  . 

. 147 

27  ff  . 

.  .171,  174,  196,  250 

51  . 

.  89 

32  . 

. 152 

3,  7-9  . 

. 163,  236 

12,  13-17  . 

. 54,  196,  250 

9  . 

. 170 

14  . 

. . . 198 

10-14  _ 

. 164,  237 

18-27  . 

. 196,  250 

21  . 

. 151,  190 

25  . 

. 93,  191,  216 

21-22  _ 

. 50,  149ff,  208 

26  . 

. 154 

23  . 

28ff  . 

. 10,  250 

4,  1-13  . 

. 152ff 

34  . 

. 198 

3-4  . 

. 157,  208 

35-3 i  . 

. 196,  250 

5-8  . 

. 208 

36  . 

. 154 

8  . 

. 157 

37  . 

. 197 

9-12  . 

. 208 

38-40  . 

. . . 196 

13  . 

. 157 

13,  . 

. 24,  141 

15f  . 

.  .  .  . . 197 

If  . 

.  74 

16-27  . 

. 186 

3-37  . 

. . . 109 

18-27  . 

.  72 

4  . 

. 217 

22  . 

. 235 

9  . 

. 141 

23  . 

. 75,  164,  187 

10  . 

. 141 

28-30  . 

. 186 

13  . 

. 141 

31-43  . 

. 203 

21ff  . 

.  14 

33  . 

.  49 

26  . 

. 3,  6 

35  . 

. 244,  255 

26f  . 

.  51 

41  . 

. 244 

26-32  . 

. 216 

42  . 

. 198 

31  . 

. 140 

42-43  . 

. 155,  189,  203 

00 

. .197 

5,  1-11  . 

. 184 

lOf  . 

. 187 

3  . 

. 197 

14ff  . 

. 197 

13  . 

. 244 

18  . 

.  .  .  .  . . 197 

14  . 

. 244 

22  ff  . 

.  51 

16  . 

.  .  .  .  . . 189 

23  f  . 

.  92 

17b  . 

. 143 

24  . 

17-6,  11  .  . 

. 195 

25  . 

. 216 

39  . 

.  92 

32-42  .  .  .  . 

. 175ff 

6,  10  . 

. 244 

33-34  . 

. . .244 

12  . 

. 190 

38  . 

. 109 

12-13  ..... 

. 190 

43ff  . 

. 187 

12ff  . 

. 189 

49  . 

. . 197 

16  . 

. 187 

62  . 

. 216 

17-49  . 

. 183 

15,  5  . 

. . . 199 

20  . 

. 143,  239 

21 . 

. 240 

20-49  . 

.  52 

33  . 

.  17 

qq 

. 142 

34  . 

. 244 

25  . 

.  18 

39  . 

. 198,  262 

28  . 

.  26 

16,  7  . 

. 167 

39  . 

. 250 

Luke 

46  . 

. 220 

1,  Ilf  . 

. 178 

47-49  . 

.  54 

26ff  . 

. .147,  178  235 

7,  9  . 

. 244 

35  . 

.  69 

13  . 

. 244 

36  . 

. 237 

16  . 

. 143 

2,  9-15  . 

. 178 

22ff  . 

.  72 

22-51  .... 

. . . 147 

24-35  . 

. 236 

33  . 

. . . 147 

28  . 

.  72 

41  ff  . 

. 94,  157 

33  . 

.  .  .  .70,  92,  163,  237 

288 


INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES 


(Cont’d) 

5-8  . 

.  12 

36ff  . 

. 197 

5-13  . 

.  52 

39  . 

9f  . 

. 250 

3  . 

. 197 

11  . 

.  89 

11-15  . 

. 144 

15  . 

. 163 

19  . 

. 235 

20  . 

. 49,  51 

19-21  . 

. 192ff 

27-28  . . . , 

. 143.  192  ff 

27  . 

29  . 

. 157,  244,  252 

29  . 

. . 255 

37  . 

. 195 

40  . 

. 198 

37-52  . . . . 

. 163,  197 

45  . 

. 198 

39-51  . . . 

.  27 

46  . 

39-52  .... 

. 196 

1-6  . 

. . (210 

1-3  1  . 

. 198 

t  . . 

. 199 

8  . 

. 142 

7  ff  . 

. 236 

9  . 

. 139,  142f 

11  . 

. 244 

22-32  _ 

.  52 

18  . 

. 189f 

37  . 

.  12 

23  . 

. 138f 

39-40  .... 

. 216 

24  . 

. 139 

42-46  .... 

. 216 

26  . 

. 139 

49  ff  . 

.  15 

26b-27  . 

. 216 

50  . 

. 63,  177 

28  . 

. 190 

5if  . 

. 26,  53 

28-29  . 

o 

o* 

CO 

rH 

51-53  .... 

.  56 

28-36  . 

. 165ff,  208 

54  . 

. 244 

29  . 

. 236 

54-56  .... 

. 252 

34-36  . 

. 262 

13,  6-9  . 

. 15,  54,  170 

35  . 

. 167,  262 

17  . 

. 197f 

36  . 

.  75,  165 

18-21  . . . 

.  51 

37  . 

. 190 

25-27  .... 

. 142f 

37-42  . 

. 255 

30  . 

. 250 

41  . 

. 244 

31  . 

. 199 

47  . 

. 244 

31f  . 

.  86 

48  . 

. 137,  140 

34b  . 

. 244 

49  . 

. 210 

39  . 

. 217 

51ff  . 

. 185 

14,  1-24  . 

. 197 

52ff  . 

. 170 

6  . 

. 198 

55  . 

. 244 

11  . 

. 250 

57-60  . 

. 142 

25f  . 

. 191 

57-62  . 

.  73 

25-30  . . . 

.  54 

60  . 

.  98 

26  . 

. 73.  85,  103.  137 

1-16  . 

. 210 

27  . 

. 138f 

12ff  . 

. 195 

33  . 

.  73 

13  . 

. 244 

15,  4-10  . 

.  54 

13ff  . . 

. 17,  27 

7  . 

. 140 

16  . 

. 137 

8-9  . 

.  12 

17  . 

. 210 

11-32  .... 

.  12 

17-20  . 

.  52 

16,  1-13  .  .  .  . 

. 248 

18  .64,  74,  97, 

113,  207,  208ff 

18  . 

. 191 

19  . 

.  84 

19-31  .... 

.  74 

21  . .  .  .  .  . 

. 137f,  244 

17,  1-2  . 

. 140 

21ff  . 

. 84,  100 

6  . 

. 169 

22  . 

. 137f 

12-19  .  . . 

. 194 

29  37 

.  12 

20  f  . 

.  51 

1  . 

. 189,  236 

22ff  .... 

. 14.  51 

Iff  . 

. 183 

26-27  .  . . 

. 216 

2ff  . . 

. 143 

33  . 

. . . .139,  250 

INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES  289 


Luke  (Cont’d) 

24,  19  . 

34-35  . 

. 216 

34  . 

39-52  . 

.  52 

J  ohn 

18,  1-7  . 

1,  1-5  . 

1-14  . 

. 190 

9-14  . 

. . .133 

2-8  . . 

.  52 

16  . 

........ _ 132 

10-13  . 

19f  . 

. 194 

15-17  . 

. 1 _ 194 

31  . 

. 238 

16  . 

. 140,  244 

32-33  . 

. 150 

17  . 

. 140,  244 

32-34  . 

. 134 

22  . 

2,  Iff  . 

.  92 

29  . 

4  . 

.  27 

42  . 

11  . 

. . . ..131 

19,  5  . 

20f  . 

. 162 

27  . 

3,  Iff  . . 

. 194 

45-46  . 

. 171ff 

3  . 

. 129 

47  . 

3ff  . 

. 98 

47-48  . 

. 171  ff 

4  . 

. 162 

20,  Iff  . 

4ff  . 

. .  13 

1-8  . 

5  . 

. 129 

6  . 

11  . . 

. 132 

20-26  . 

llff  . 

. 129 

27-38  . 

196 

13  . 

.  3 

35  . 

. 216 

13-14  . 

. 130 

35f  . 

. 191 

14-16  . 

. 132f 

36  . 

16  . 

. 135 

39  . . 

. 198 

31ff  . 

. 129,  133 

41-44  . 

. 196 

4,  11  . 

. . 162 

45-47  . 

. . . 196 

22  . 

. . .132 

21,  12  . 

. 141 

26  . 

. 130 

17  . 

. 141 

31ff  . 

. . . 92 

27 

3 

33  . 

. 162 

27-33  . 

. 216 

54  . 

. 131 

33  . .  . 

. 140 

5,  16  . 

. . 130 

22,  3ff  . 

. 187 

19  . .  .  .  .  . 

. . 131 

15  . 

. 244 

19-23  . 

. 133 

18  . 

. 216 

25-29  ... _ 

. 133 

28  . 

. 157 

35  . 

. . . .133 

28-30  . 

. 216 

37b-39  . 

. 133 

30  . 

.  51 

38  . 

. 132 

31-32  . . . . 

. 190 

43  . 

. 133 

35  . 

. 206 

46-47  . 

. . 133 

36  . 

.  63 

6,  2  . 

. 131 

39-46  . 

. 175ff 

14  . 

. . .131 

40  . 

. 244 

26  . 

. 131 

43  . 

. 97,  208 

27  . 

. 130,  132 

43-44  . 

. 67,  178 

29  . 

. 133 

47ff 

187 

35  . 

. 129,  134 

69 

216 

40  . 

. . 133 

23  8 

199 

42  . 

. 162 

OR 

240 

48  . 

. 129 

29 

93 

48  51  . 

. 133 

34 

244 

51  . 

. 129 

43 

77  244 

52  . 

. 162 

47 

104 

53  . 

. 130 

48  . 

. 198 

55-57  . 

. 133 

290 


INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES 


John  (Cont’d) 

58  . 

. 133 

27-30  . . . 
30  . 

.  Qfi 

62  . 

. 3,  130 

36  . 

64  . 

. 187 

37-38  .  .  . 

70-71  . 

. 187 

38  . 

7,  2  . 

. 168 

11,  4  . 

. 131 

5  . 

. 164 

9-10  . 

. 133 

16-17  . 

. 133 

13  . 

18  . 

. 133 

15  . 

19f  . 

. 75,  164 

24 

20  . 

.  49 

25  . 

. 129 

22  f  . 

. 130 

25-26  . . . 

. 134 

35  . 

. 162 

12,  . 

. 194 

37-38  . 

. 133 

4-6  . 

. . 187 

8,  . 

.  24 

24  f  . 

. 129 

2-11  . 

. 248,  250 

25  . 

. 139 

6  . 

. 127 

27  . 

. 75,  101,  178 

7  . 

. 129 

28ff  . 

. 77,  84,  91,  167 

8  . 

. 105 

29  . 

. 164 

12  . 

. 129,  134 

32  . 

. 133 

19  . 

. 131 

34  . 

. 130 

22  . 

. 162 

35-36  .... 

. 133 

26  . 

. 208 

37  . 

. 131 

27  . 

. 162 

44-50  .... 

. 133 

28  . 

. 208 

13,  2  . 

. 187 

29  . 

. 131 

10-11  ... 

. 187 

31  . 

. 133 

13-15  _ 

. 133 

32  . 

. 132 

16  . 

. 129 

38-40  . 

. 208 

18-19  .... 

. 187 

42  . 

. 133 

21-30  .... 

. 187 

48f  . 

.  75 

31-32  . .  . , 

. 133 

48-52  . 

. 49,  164 

14,  1-4  . 

. 133 

51  . 

. 133 

5  . 

. 163 

56-58  . 

. 27 

6  . 

. 129,  134 

57  . 

. 162 

6-7  . 

. 133 

58  .... 

. 3 

11-21  . 

. 133 

59  . 

.  27 

23c  . 

. 131 

9,  3  . 

. 84,  130 

25-27  .... 

. 133 

4 . 

. 132 

15,  1  . 

. 129 

14  . 

. 130 

'iff  . 

. 130,  133 

16 

. 131 

5  . 

. 134 

37 

130 

13  . 

. 133 

10  1-5 

133 

14-27  _ 

. 133 

1-16 

12,  130 

20  . 

. 129 

6 

.162 

16,  1  . 

. 133 

7 

129 

2  . 

. 133 

7f 

.  .  83 

3-6  . 

. 133 

7b-lla 

133 

7b-15  .  .  . 

. 133 

9 

129.  134 

17-18  _ 

. 163 

10b 

.135 

21  . 

. 129 

11 

129  134 

23  24  .  . . . 

. 133 

llb-13 

133 

27-28  . .  .  , 

. 133 

14 

129 

28  . 

.  3 

14  18 

133 

33  . 

. 133 

19  fF 

75,  164 

17  i_2  . 

. 133 

20-21  . 

.  49 

Iff  . 

.  83 

INDEX  OF  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES 


291 


John  (Cont’d) 

1-26  . 

3  . 

4-26  . 

5  . 

.134 
.134 
.133 
.  3 

I.  Corinthians 

9,  1  . 

14,  2  . 

16  . 

ISf  . 

. 205,  230 

.  62 

.  62 

.  62 

12  . 

.187 

23  . 

.  62 

21  . . . 

.131 

15,  5  . 

. 90,  167 

18,  Iff  . 

.187 

7  . 

. 90,  236 

11  . 

.178 

8  . 

. 205,  230 

37b  . 

.133 

II.  Corinthians 

10,  5  . 

.  77 

2,  12-13  . 

. 211,  230 

1] . 

.133 

4,  6  . 

_ _ _ _ 205,  230 

25-27  . 

.192 

5,  13  . 

. 161 

26f  . 

.  89 

10,  . . 

.  62 

34  . 

.  93 

12,  . 

. 62,  225 

35-37  . 

.132 

1  . . . 

. 205,  229  f 

20,  30  . 

.131 

Iff  . . 

. 225ff 

30-31  . 

.133 

2-4  . 

. 229 

Acts 

5-10  . 

. 228 

1,  9  . 

.167 

7  . 

. 227 

10  . 

.178 

7ff  . 

. 225ff 

16-20  . 

.187 

10  . 

. ..108,  124 

2,  14-36  . 

.144 

Galatians 

5,  19  . 

.178 

1,  16-17  . 

. 205,  230 

8,  7  . 

.  49 

17  18  . 

. 204 

9,  . 

.  .62, 

167 

19  . .  .  . 

. 236 

1-9  . 

.205, 

230 

2,  2  . 

. 211,  230 

10,  38  . . 

.  58 

9  . . .  . 

. 236 

12,  7  . 

.178 

12  . 

. 236 

15,  13-21  . 

.236 

4  . 

.  62 

'  23-29  . 

.236 

*5  . 

13-14  . 

. 229 

16,  9  . 

. .  .  .178, 

211, 

230 

14  . 

. 226 

18,  9-10  . 

211 

230 

14f  . 

. 227 

25  . 

.236 

6,  11  . 

. 226 

19,  3  . 

.236 

Ephesians 

21,  13  . 

.  63 

q  q 

. 205,  230 

18  . 

236 

Philippians 

26  . 

.225 

8  12  . 

. 205,  230 

22,  6-11 . 

.205, 

230 

Hebrews 

17-21  . 

. . . .178, 

211, 

230 

*  . 

. 178 

23,  11  . 

.  .  .  .178, 

211, 

230 

IT.  Peter 

26,  13-19  . 

205 

230 

1  17  18  . 

. 91,  167 

27,  10  . 

.  63 

Revelations 

23  . 

.211, 

230 

12,  9  . 

. 210 

PERSONAL  REGISTER 


Abraham,  80f. 

Ambrosius,  168. 

Amicis,  de,  63. 

Amos,  62,  202. 

Ampere,  37. 

Aristotle,  36. 

Bacon,  188. 

Baldensperger,  2,  154f,  1 66,  200ff,  270. 

Barth,  270. 

Bauer,  B.,  170,  178,  188,  270. 

Bauer,  W.,  154,  270. 

Baumann,  xiv,  48,  107ff,  11 6,  123f,  1 66,  224,  270. 

Berg,  111. 

Beth,  125. 

Beyschlag,  2,  150,  l68f,  202,  270. 

Biflod,  89. 

Binet-Sangle,  xiii,  2,  24,  30,  47 f,  82,  86ff,  110,  120,  1 22fF,  126, 
128f,  131,  143,  145,  149f,  153,  159,  165,  l67f,  171,  175f,  178, 
181,  188 ff,  193,  200,  206,  208ff,  219,  234f,  240f,  247,  257, 
267,  270. 

Binswanger,  175,  207,  212,  233f,  238,  243,  253,  257,  271. 

Bischoff,  108. 

Bismarck,  165. 

Bleek,  161,  168,  173,  271. 

Boecklin,  36. 

Bollinger,  163,  271. 

Bousset,  43,  114,  196,  228f,  271. 

Boylan,  37. 

Brandt,  186f. 

Brightman,  viii. 

Buddha,  43,  62. 

Burkitt,  184,  234,  271. 

Caesar,  63,  228. 

Cardano,  37. 

Carpenter,  144,  245,  271. 

Case,  40,  152,  154,  223,  271. 

Castor,  144,  271. 

Cavour,  37. 

Celsus,  69,  79. 

Cephas,  90. 


293 


294 


PERSONAL  REGISTER 


Clement  of  Alexandria,  152. 

Codazzi,  37. 

Columbus,  37. 

Constantine  the  Great,  xii. 

Conybeare,  225ff,  271. 

Cutten,  259,  27 1. 

Dalman,  108. 

Darwin,  31. 

Deissmann,  211,  225,  271. 

Delius,  von,  111,  112f,  153,  204,  272. 

DeWette,  3. 

Dieckhoff,  174,  21  If,  217,  26lf,  272. 

Dorner,  34,  272. 

Dostojewsky,  20. 

Drews,  39. 

Duerer,  36. 

Duhm,  26l,  272. 

Dulk,  28. 

Elijah,  62,  88,  95,  105,  153. 

Elisha,  62,  88,  95. 

Elizabeth,  the  mother  of  the  Baptist,  70,  236fF. 
Emmerich,  187. 

Emmet,  272. 

Eusebius,  227. 

Eysinga,  van  den  Bergh  van,  270. 

Ezekiel,  62,  211,  26lf,  272. 

Fere,  175f. 

Feuerbach,  36. 

Frennsen,  11  If,  224,  272. 

Friedlaender,  196. 

Galileo,  37. 

Gideon,  81. 

Goethe,  36,  165. 

Hall,  124,  239,  272. 

Harnack,  von,  43,  143f,  195,  201,  272. 

Harrington,  37. 

Hartmann,  von,  9ff,  26f,  57,  66,  74,  98,  145,  168,  200,  272. 
Hase,  von,  2,  159f,  187,  272. 

Hauptmann,  68,  111. 

Hausrath,  38,  43,  228,  272. 

Hawkins,  160,  245,  273. 

Heitmueller,  40f,  273. 

Hennig,  273. 

Hieronymus,  154,  227. 

Hilarius,  152. 


PERSONAL  REGISTER 


295 


Hillel,  10, 

Hirsch,  xiiif,  30,  47f,  79ff,  HO,  120,  122,  124,  128,  131,  143,  150, 
153,  l65f,  196,  200,  208f,  219,  224,  234,  257,  263,  267,  273. 
Hoffmann,  160,  273. 

Holbach,  von,  168. 

Holbek,  63. 

Hollmann,  30,  40f,  124,  129,  228,  273. 

Holtzmann,  H.  J.,  2,  28,  40,  119,  157,  194,  200f,  205,  210,  216, 
220,  222,  273. 

Holtzmann,  O.,  xiv,  7,  30,  40f,  48ff,  114,  1 1 6,  120,  123f,  149,  152f, 
158,  161,  166,  l69f,  173f,  181,  192,  194,  200,  207ff,  262 f, 
267,  273. 

Horne,  145. 

Hosea,  62. 

Hnck,  vii,  139,  140,  142,  152,  154,  157,  167,  170,  178,  273. 

Irenaeus,  151. 

Isaac,  81. 

Isaiah,  62,  81,  202. 

Jackson,  128,  273. 

Jacob,  81. 

James,  the  brother  of  Jesus,  22,  70,  90,  95,  235 f. 

James,  Wm.,  xiff,  30,  36,  263,  274. 

Jeanne  d’Arc,  8,  212. 

Jeremiah,  48,  59f,  62f. 

John  the  Baptist,  7,  9 ,  11,  13,  50f,  7 Off,  81,  83,  95,  108,  117,  121, 
130,  134,  149ff,  163,  170,  184,  207,  235,  236ff,  239. 

Jonah,  105. 

Jordan,  42,  123f,  274. 

Joseph,  the  father  of  Jesus,  69,  84,  89ff,  235f,  238. 

Josephus,  26,  236. 

Judas,  the  brother  of  Jesus,  90. 

Judas  Iscariot,  77,  91,  102,  121,  187f. 

Juelicher,  119,  142,  164,  226,  274. 

Justin  Martyr,  152. 

Kaeferli,  4. 

Kant,  36,  177,  263. 

Keim,  2,  42,  69,  160,  169,  173,  233,  274. 

Kent,  145. 

Kepler,  37. 

Kierkegaard,  60,  63,  67. 

Klein,  197,  274. 

Kneib,  29,  35,  42,  115f,  123f,  131,  274. 

Knudson,  viiif,  26 1,  274. 

Koegel,  274. 

Kraepelin,  175,  212,  234,  243,  247ff,  251,  253,  257L  274. 


296 


PERSONAL  REGISTER 


Krafft-Ebing,  von,  xii,  34f,  212f,  232ff,  238,  242f,  247f,  252ff, 
Lcgiie,  93. 

Lamartine,  36. 

Lang,  6. 

Lange,  169- 
Law,  246,  275. 

Lazzaretti,  56,  63,  66. 

Lee,  63. 

Lenan,  37. 

Lepsius,  159f,  181,  275. 

Lewi,  63. 

Lewin,  67. 

Lietzmann,  227,  275. 

Loewenfeld,  36. 

Loisy,  184,  186. 

Lombroso,  36,  37f,  27 5. 

Lomer,  67ff,  275. 

Loofs,  39ff,  43,  124,  128f,  213,  215f,  275. 

Loosten,  de,  viii,  24,  29f,  36,  38,  40f,  48,  67ff,  110,  113f,  11 6,  120, 
122ff,  128,  131,  149,  153,  l64f,  168,  171,  175,  193,  196^  200, 
206,  208ff,  234f,  240,  246f,  250,  257,  267,  275. 

Lowstuter,  viii. 

Luther,  38,  59,  63,  110,  165,  212. 

Malachi,  81. 

Mary,  the  mother  of  Jesus,  23,  70,  84,  89f,  159ff,  178,  192f,  235f, 
238. 

Mathews,  145. 

Maudsley,  xii,  253. 

Maurenbrecher,  185. 

Michel  Angelo,  36f. 

Millet,  36. 

Moebius,  36. 

Moerchen,  xiii,  35,  123,  125,  l64f,  190f,  195,  200,  211,  241f,  249, 
263,  266f,  275. 

Mohammed,  vii,  60,  63,  66,  69,  HO,  212. 

Mohammed  Ahmed,  63. 

Moreau,  36. 

Moses,  81,  153,  l6l. 

Moses,  J.,  240f,  263,  275. 

Mozart,  148. 

Mueller,  9- 

Napoleon,  37,  63,  212,  228. 

Naumann,  29f,  38,  113,  123,  125,  276. 

Neander,  160,  169,  173,  276. 

Nestle,  140,  142,  276. 


PERSONAL  REGISTER 


297 


Newton,  37. 

Niebergall,  124,  276. 

Nietzsche,  2,  l6ff,  27,  44,  145,  276. 

Ninck,  24,  276. 

Nisbet,  36. 

Noack,  187. 

Orelli,  261. 

Origen,  69,  139,  152,  154,  168,  172. 

Otto,  43 f,  276. 

Pascal,  36,  212. 

Paul,  the  Apostle,  xiif,  41,  43,  51,  58,  62f,  80f,  108,  136,  205f, 
21  If,  223,  224ff. 

Paulus,  168,  172,  178,  187,  276. 

Peabody,  145. 

Peschel,  110. 

Pfannmueller,  124,  276. 

Pfleiderer,  225f,  276. 

Preusehen,  225. 

Paphael,  36. 

Rasmussen,  xiiif,  26,  29f,  35,  40,  47f,  56ff,  75,  78,  81,  91,  HO,  113f, 
ll6f,  120,  123fF,  145,  149,  166,  171,  175,  180f,  188,  193,  196, 
200,  208,  210,  212,  224,  226,  255f,  267,  276. 

Rauschenbusch,  145. 

Reimarus,  32,  39,  186,  256. 

Reinecke,  148. 

Reinhard,  1,  264f,  277. 

Renan,  7ff,  20,  23,  87,  113,  136,  187,  192,  194f,  218,  277. 

Resch,  152,  277. 

Reville,  179,  277. 

Ribot,  131,  159,  241,  250ff,  259f,  277. 

Riggenbach,  ix,  123. 

Roosevelt,  165. 

Rothenburg,  30,  56f,  219. 

Rousseau,  36f. 

Samt,  254. 

Samuel,  81,  147. 

Sandav,  47,  277. 

Saul,  81. 

Schaefer,  111,  ll6ff,  123ff,  195,  267,  277. 

Schmiedel,  O.,  55f,  277- 

Schmiedel,  P.  W.  11,  128,  l6l,  194,  222,  265,  277. 

Schopenhauer,  36f. 

Schuerer,  196. 

Schultze,  253ff,  277. 

Schuman,  37. 


298 


PERSONAL  REGISTER 


Schuster,  27 8. 

Schweitzer,  1,  24,  39,  43f,  47,  113,  116,  119ff,  124,  128f,  150,  l65ff 
169,  181,  1 85f,  187,  19lf,  200,  202,  209,  215ff,  265,  278. 
Seeligmueller,  227f. 

Semler,  32. 

Siemerling,  257,  278. 

Smith,  S.,  278. 

Smith,  W.  B.,  39. 

Soares,  145. 

Socrates,  177,  212. 

Soden,  von,  278. 

Sommer,  165. 

Soury,  20ff,  42,  70,  235,  278. 

Spitta,  166,  170,  174,  178,  184,  278. 

Strauss,  xiii,  xv,  2ff,  8,  15,  20,  27,  41f,  56,  113,  119,  128,  13lf,  138 
147,  153,  l69f,  172f,  181,  186,  193,  200,  219,  278. 
Swedenborg,  63,  110. 

Swift,  37. 

Szeckenyi,  37. 

Tasso,  37. 

Teresa,  260. 

Tischendorf-Gebhardt,  vii,  140,  142. 

Tours,  de,  22. 

Venturing  153,  159,  178,  278. 

Voelter,  147,  278. 

Volkmar,  l60f,  163,  1 69,  173,  179,  279- 
Voltaire,  37. 

Wade,  151. 

Washburn,  2,  241F,  79,  239,  279- 

Weber,  114f,  118,  125,  179,  217,  222,  227f,  239,  259,  267,  279- 
Weidel,  38,  44 ff,  201,  207,  246,  279. 

Weinel,  17,  19f,  43,  124,  211,  225,  279. 

Weiss,  B.,  150,  l60f,  172f,  178,  181,  279- 

Weiss,  J.,  48,  139,  l66fF,  174,  183,  202,  207,  210,  215,  279. 

Weisse,  177,  186,  279. 

Weizsaecker,  201,  279- 

Wellhausen,  4,  48,  108,  119,  127,  139,  142fF,  160,  l66f,  181,  197 
210,  214,  245,  280. 

Wendland,  227,  280. 

Wendling,  l6l,  280. 

Wendt,  201,  280. 

Werner,  29,  39,  42ff,  108,  113ff,  119,  123fF,  128f,  149,  165,  206 
213,  215,  237f,  280. 

Wernle,  ix,  39,  128,  141,  143,  170,  177,  183,  264f,  280. 

Westcott  &  Hort,  140,  142,  281. 


PERSONAL  REGISTER 


299 


Westphal,  169,  181,  281. 

Windisch,  40,  124,  281. 

Wrede,  xii,  44,  91,  127,  1 31  f,  135,  138,  162,  181,  205,  211,  214, 
228,  281. 

Zelenka,  126. 

Ziegler,  6,  119,  281. 


I 


I 


Princeton 


1  1012  01190 


Date  Due 

> 

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9 

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